The Treasure Hunters
by LizzieBoleyn
Summary: Back in Narnia after the Voyage of the Dawn Treader Edmund, Lucy and Eustace are enjoying an idyllic summer. An act of kindness to a damsel in distress leads to adventure for the children, Caspian and Drinian.
1. Chapter 1 Damsel In Distress

Author's Notes: I own nothing you recognise! I recently went to see Prince Caspian and it's kick-started my Narnia fanfic, so here's the first chapter of a story I've had loitering since writing my Vignettes from a Voyage. This Caspian is modelled on the one I envisaged from Voyage of the Dawn Treader, not the Ben Barnes version. Hope you enjoy it.

_**THE TREASURE HUNTERS**_

_**CHAPTER ONE**_

_**Damsel In Distress**_

The sound of laughter echoed from the ancient oaks, beech and chestunts of the Narnian woods. Five people - two tall young men and three children, a girl and two boys - ambled together along the defined, pebble-edged path though sunlit glades toward the coast. "Goodness!" cried the girl in a high, trilling voice. "I'd quite forgotten how _noisy_ market day can be!"

"So'd I, Lu," said the taller of the two boys, an alert-looking lad with just enough of a similarity about the eyes and mouth to be identified as her brother. "Still, it's good to get out and about, Caspian; and to see you weren't exaggerating when you said Narnia's prospering again."

The smaller of the two men, handsome like his friend, and as fair as the other was dark, lifted his hands. "One must allow a King to boast of his achievements, Edmund; you of all people know that," he said cheerfully. "Lion bless me, what's the commotion? I do believe there's somebody clambering in that single large chestnut tree yonder!"

"Help!" cried a female voice from within the lush green canopy of a lone stout tree in the centre of the glade. "Travellers, whomever you may be, pray pause and help me!"

"I know that voice!" cried the dark-haired man, starting forward with his lofty head tipped back. "Lady Herringbone! What do you _do_, scrambling about in a tree?"

"Oh, my Lord!" A rosy face topped with a tangle of looping brown curls peered between the branches. "Aslan be thanked, I - oh, Your Majesty, crave pardon, I ought not to have addressed Your Highness so roughly…."

"Good lady, never mind our royal sensibilities, pray tell us what you _do_ and how we may be of service!" cried Caspian. "My Lord Drinian…"

"'Tis all the fault of my abominable brother Tamarin, Sire," wailed the distressed lady. "He stole my precious sewing box… you must know of it, my Lord, for I'm sure your wife, my dear friend, must have spoken of it…"

"The ancient Archenlandish box?" Drinian, lord of the great northern province of Etinsmere, contrived to maintain a perfectly serious mien. Yes, his young wife had told him the tale of the antique box as it had been told to her (for Daniela was a remarkably fine mimic) with all its exclamation points and underlinings included. "A fair prize for the young master to seize, but for what purpose?"

"I tell the wretch never to touch something, and he must at once have his grubby fingers all over it!" Master Tamarin's sister exclaimed. "He confessed - as he fled the house - to concealing it here - I have it, but now… how am I ever to get _down_ without doing _it_ harm, or breaking both my legs?"

"Toss the box down for us to catch," Lucy suggested earnestly. The other's wide hazel eyes almost popped.

"I - oh, but if it were to be dropped, I should be… you _will_ be careful? 'Tis so old and precious, I…"

"Too precious to be left up in a tree, and I see small other hope of getting both you and it down than the method that Queen Lucy suggests." Drinian's stern voice at least stopped an outpouring of incoherent alarms. "Now, my Lady, let the box fall on my command: we shall stand ready, and the moment we have it caught, we may begin to consider some method of rescuing _you_."

Alicia, Lady Herringbone (to give the lady in the tree her full name) thought for a moment, then gave way. "Can you see it?" she asked anxiously, shaking something until the branches beneath her trembled. Edmund cried out.

"_I_ can! Right above your head, Scrubb, see? Gather round, everyone. Caspian - Lu, move left a touch, will you? Right! One of us is sure to catch it now!"

The five on the ground formed themselves into a tight knot, hands upraised. "Oh, dear!" squealed the lady in the tree. "Oh, do be _careful_! Oh, _dear_!"

With a rustling shower of leaves and the snapping of small twigs, the Herringbone household's pride and joy dropped to earth. Five pairs of hands snatched at the air. "Oh well _held_, Ed!" cried Lucy.

Triumphant, he brandished up his trophy. "No harm done, Lady Herringbone!" he promised the lady, who seemed close to fainting out of her perch with relief. "Now you can use both hands, can you find a way down?"

"Oh, dear!" It seemed to be all she could say. The group on the ground heard the sounds of frantic scrabbling against the tree trunk; more leaves drifted down to adorn their hair. "Oh, goodness me! No, King Edmund, I appear to be completely stuck!"

Caspian and Drinian shared a speaking look. "Remain quite still, Ma'am," Drinian instructed, as sharply as if the young woman were an especially hapless member of his ship's company aboard the royal galleon Dawn Treader. "If Your Majesty would be so kind as to take my cloak, I'll go aloft, see what can be done."

Caspian tossed the short, blue woollen garment over his arm and, nimble as a monkey, Drinian vaulted up into the branches, the three children straining to monitor his progress. "Now, Ma'am," they heard him say soothingly from the canopy over their heads. "Bring the left hand back _here,_ that's right. Right foot down, slowly now, that's the way."

"Oh, dear!" cried Lady Herringbone. "Oh, when I get my hands on that horrid little soul… oh! Oh, I have a foothold now, I see! Thank you, my Lord, I'm all right now, I think. Oh goodness, I do feel giddy!"

Drinian slithered down first, turning quickly to offer a steadying hand to the lady who, hindered by her long gown, huffed and gasped her way to safety behind him. With a great rent torn down one side of the yellow skirt and leaves dripping from her curls, Alicia, Lady Herringbone, almost fell into a curtsy before her sovereign.

"Oh, Sire!" she gasped, fanning her grimy face with one hand. "Your Majesties - young master - my Lord Drinian, thank you all so, I really do feel quite faint! Pray overlook my rude manner in hailing you!"

"Think no more of it, m'lady," said Caspian placatingly. He steered her toward a grassy knoll and urged her down. "Sit and recover your breath a while. Now, this scapegrace, your brother…"

"Only fourteen, Sire, but mischievous as a bagful of monkeys," the lady declared. Her gaze shifted from the eminent personages around her to the small, scuffed box in Edmund's hands. "_This_ is our family's greatest treasure; well does he know its value! Your Majesty - King Edmund, if I might…"

"Oh, yes, of course." If this scratched little wooden tub was her household's most precious item, Edmund decided, studying the long, fleshy fingers for rings, it must be a pretty miserable one!

As he passed it into her outstretched palms a fingernail, broken in catching the box, snagged on a crack in the wood. There was a tiny scratching sound: slowly, reluctantly, a portion of the timber at the base creaked away from the rest.

"Oh, Ed! You've broken it!" exclaimed his sister reproachfully. "Look!"

Horror-struck, everyone stared. "I doubt there's any damage," said Eustace slowly. "Look closer. It's a secret drawer; you must've caught the release mechanism, Edmund!"

"Aslan's Mane!" cried Lady Herringbone. "This box has been in the possession of my family these two centuries, and I'm sure we never knew - how very clever of you, Sire, to find such a thing!"

"I do believe there's something inside!" said Lucy, peering down into the shallow tray.

"Looks like parchment," Edmund decided, frowning. "Lady Herringbone, may I…"

"Be my guest, Sire; I'm sure it's naught of use to _me_!"

"Thank you." Very carefully, half expecting the fragile piece to crumble under his touch, Edmund levered the folded yellowing sheet from its hiding place. "Glory! I wonder how old it _is_? Hear how it crackles! It could be _ancient_."

"The box is six hundred and more years old, Your Majesty." Alicia Herringbone, as Drinian's wife could have warned them (had she been of their party, not back at the castle of Cair Paravel in the company of Caspian's queen, awaiting their return), could out-chatter Pattertwig and all his troupe of Talking Squirrels on a subject that really interested her. "It was given to my great-great-great - oh, I forget how many times great - grandmother, more than two hundred years ago, by an admirer - an Archenlander. Of its history before that, we know little; 'tis said it was made by a sailor, and passed down through his relations until _his_ descendant gave it to _mine. _It was said, you know…"

Lucy nodded politely, allowing the young woman's excited voice to drift through the back of her mind. Edmund, she realised, was fondling the aged parchment with admiration. No points for guessing, she thought, just as he seized the brief moment of the lady pausing for breath to make his request.

"I wonder, would you let me take this old scrap?" he asked, trying very hard (and failing quite miserably, in Caspian's opinion) to keep the eagerness out of his voice. "I rather like _very_ old things."

"Take it and be welcome, Sire." Hugging her box to herself, Lady Herringbone had not the remotest interest in a dirty piece of long-forgotten parchment. "My Lord Drinian, are you not ashamed of yourself? It has been some time since I was last in my dear friend Daniela's company: do you mean to deprive your wife of all her old friends' society?"

"That, Ma'am, I should never dare attempt," replied the gentleman, with perfect solemnity. "Ah! Master Tamarin loiters to see the result of his mischief. Fly, young master! I should be quaking, were I in your boots!"

"Tamarin! Why, you spawn of the devil Tash, I'll - I'll give you such a thrashing, you shan't sit to table for a week!" Still clinging to her treasure, Lady Herringbone sprang to her feet and raced in pursuit of a flash of dull brown Lucy gathered to be her incorrigible brother. "Come back here _at once_!"


	2. Chapter 2 Anna

_**Anna**_

"What a very odd creature!" exclaimed Eustace as, with the lady's shrill cries fading away, they continued their ambling way toward home. "Who ever is she, Drinian?"

"Alicia Casker, she was born; daughter to a prosperous merchant of Glasswater village. After the murder of the her father Daniela was confined with her mother, almost a prisoner in her own province. The daughters of honest folk like the Caskers were her only company."

"How horrible for her!" said Edmund, with more truth than tact. Lucy tutted.

"Honestly, Edmund, I'm sure she's a dear!" she protested. Eustace sniggered into his hand.

"While we were sailing east, she married a gentleman of Beaversdam province," Drinian went on, retrieving his cloak from Caspian and tossing its carelessly over his shoulders. "Daniela declares the acquisition of a title - albeit a minor one - has quite turned the lady's head. She'll not be pleased that by our _interference_, an invitation she cannot politely refuse has been offered."

"Blame it on me, Drinian," Caspian volunteered at once.

"Begging Your Majesty's pardon, but I was already intending to! We ought to make haste; we're expected in the council chamber this afternoon."

"Eh?" Caspian frowned. "Hang it, of course! Those tedious ambassadors from Galma."

"Had Your Majesty not affronted their Duke…"

"By not marrying his squinting daughter!" Eustace continued.

"And then bringing the future Queen of Narnia to his banqueting hall on the way home," added Edmund.

"Our relations with that pestilential island might have been less strained of late," Drinian finished. Throwing up his hands, Caspian conceded defeat.

"Very well, very _well_, the presence of those two pompous monstrosities is all my fault! Now, no more of this dawdling, lest by arriving late in our own council chamber we contrive to offend the Galmians further!"

* * *

"I don't know what on Earth you wanted that filthy, crumpled scrap for," Eustace informed his cousin as he flopped onto Lucy's bed in the grand Lion guest chamber, high in one of the fairytale towers of Caspian's island castle, Cair Paravel. "It even _smells_ nasty!"

"If you'd been stuck in a secret drawer for hundreds of years, you'd not exactly smell of lilies yourself!"

"Oh, honestly!" cried Lucy, who was squeezed onto the foot of the bed while he sprawled. "_Boys_! Is there anything written on it, Ed?"

Her brother lifted the faded parchment to the window, letting light stream through its brittle extent. "There are lines, I think," said Eustace. "But - well - if there are _letters_, I can't see 'em!"

""What's that?" With the tip of a finger, Edmund grazed the faintest sign of ancient ink, better felt than seen after so many years.

"It looks like - well, it's a squiggle!" exclaimed Eustace.

"Could it be a map?" suggested Lucy, squinting as badly as the Duke of Galma's unfortunate daughter ever had. "Ugh! It's horribly dusty, too!"

Edmund perched himself uncomfortably on the narrow window ledge, turning his prize this way and that. "By Jove, Lu, I think you're right!" he cried, delighted. "See? _That_ turning line might just be a coastline. I wonder if we could compare it with some of Drinian's charts, see if we can't identify…"

"Hi! I think there _might_ be a few remnants of letters, in the top right corner." Eustace launched himself off the bed. "See? Just there!"

Three tousled heads bent over the ancient document. "You're blocking the light," Edmund objected. Neither of his companions moved.

"That's an A," Lucy announced confidently, frightened to breathe on the paper, much less touch it.

"In that case, so's that." Eustace was less delicate, and with a huff Edmund snatched his prize from the grasping hand. "Looks like it might be the end of a word; that's a pretty fancy scribble at the bottom of it!"

"The two in the middle look similar," Edmund commented, twisting his neck painfully to look closer. "The tops of M's, perhaps?"

"Amma? What kind of word's that?" Eustace scoffed. "Anyway, they look more like N's to me!"

"Anna, then?" Lucy's forehead furrowed. Eustace whistled softly.

"You don't think…" he stammered. "I mean, it couldn't be…"

Edmund's mouth flapped. His shoulders heaved.

"Couldn't be what?" Lucy squealed, looking worried. "Stop being so _mysterious_!"

"Anna. A Map. _Think_, Lu!" Edmund seemed undecided whether he should leap about like a mad thing or fall into a heap. "Don't you remember the story Drinian told us, that night on Dragon island?"

"The Fair Maid of Terebinthia and - oh!" Lucy sat down with a heavy thump on the floor. "There was supposed to have been a map made, wasn't there?" she finished weakly.

"A map that's not been seen in centuries," Eustace continued. "Made by the last man to know where Anna's treasure was hidden . Just imagine - suppose _we_ have it now!"

"Nonsense!" said Edmund, with less conviction than he had intended. "I mean - it's impossible! The treasure story's just an ancient legend."

"Lots of ancient legends have some kind of truth behind them," Lucy argued reasonably. "When Caspian's nurse was telling him bedtime stories about the Four Sovereigns and the White Witch, he thought we were just characters in an _ancient legend_, didn't he?"

"And if this _is_ the map… golly, Lu, it's almost as old as we are!"

Three bright faces were split with identical bedazzled grins. "We've got to tell Caspian and Drinian," said Lucy.

"Let's go!" Eustace was halfway to the door.

"We can't," said Edmund sharply. "They're in the Council Chamber."

"They might have finished with the ambassadors by now!" Eustace argued.

"Or we can wait outside in Caspian's Receiving Room." cried Lucy.

"You've convinced me." Three long strides had Edmund through the door before they could block his way. "Bother!" he added. "They're right at the other side of the castle."

"Then we'd better run for it!" yelled Eustace, bolting past. On yelps of exuberant outrage, his cousins chased him, almost knocking the pretty servant coming up the main stair back down again.

"Sorry!" yelled Lucy politely. "Ed, wait for me!"

Down the Great Stair and through the Entrance Hall, into the First Reception Hall with its gilded Lion on the ceiling and its murals depicting Aslan's visits bright on the walls. Through huge double doors into the Throne Room (where the Four Thrones of the Ancient Sovereigns still stood) without pause to admire the glorious vistas of the green Narnian mainland through giant west-facing windows. Beyond the small set of doors behind the thrones and into a smaller, cosier chamber with comfortable chairs and tapestries on the walls.

"Aslan's Mane! Your Majesties!" cried the dainty, brown-haired lady who started up from one high-backed seat near the windows. "Is the Cair afire?"

"Daniela, we've found a treasure map!"

The Mistress of Etinsmere's calmness was but one of the qualities admired by her Lord. "Indeed, Eustace?" was all she said, as golden, graceful Queen Celesta, the Star's Daughter, goggled.

"It says _Anna_ on it," Lucy affirmed. What had seemed impossible in her bedroom now appeared absolutely inescapable fact

"Anna?" The Queen rose elegantly, her quizzical gaze fixed on her Narnian friend. "I hardly see what connection… Daniela, why do you stare?"

"Impossible!" the other exclaimed. Edmund shrugged.

"That's exactly what we've tried telling ourselves! Are they _still_ rabbitting at the Galmians?"

"Doctor Cornelius has escorted the ambassadors to their apartments," said the Queen, hiding her confusion at the term (the Narnians would have called it _squirreling, _Edmund reflected) admirably. "What ever is the urgency? Daniela, I do not understand!"

"Caspian! Drinian! You've got to come out at once!" Lucy hollered, banging on the locked door of the Council Chamber. It was dragged inward, and there, quite level with hers, were a pair of bushy fox-coloured eyebrows drawn tightly together. Trumpkin, Caspian's first Dwarf ally, Regent of the Kingdom during his master's long absence on the eastern quest, rocked back on his heels, not unnaturally startled to find a Queen of Narnia yelling in his face.

"Where's the fire, Your Majesty?" he hollered. Behind him, Lucy could see the remainder of the Inner Cabinet - Trufflehunter, the aged Badger, Drinian and the King himself, half out of their seats in poses of the greatest anxiety. "Kingfishers and kettledrums, are we under attack? King Edmund, why must you wave that filthy bit o' rubbish about?"

"It's a treasure map!" Eustace yelled, as if it ought to be obvious. The Dwarf's lower jaw almost hit the carpet. "Ed got it from that batty Kipperbone woman!"

"Alicia Herringbone," Daniela translated, for the benefit of the Queen. Celesta nodded her understanding.

"I shall never look at her again without thinking of that, Eustace," she sighed. "But _please_ can somebody tell me what this is about?"

"Look!" Edmund held the parchment high, letting the light streaming through the large windows pour through its delicate creases. "Look in the top right corner and see what it says - it's a name!"

"_I_ can't see anything," said Caspian irritably. "And what if it _does_ have a name on it?"

"Honestly, Caspian, how _dense_ are you?" cried Eustace, red in the face with exasperated excitement. "Anna's treasure!"

"What - oh!" The King of Narnia blinked, then stared, like a man suddenly roused from the deepest sleep. "Drinian…"

"Sounds unlikely to me, Sire. A few letters on a torn parchment…"

"But it's not _impossible_!" He couldn't say _that_, Lucy told herself desperately.

"If there ever _was_ a map," Drinian said thoughtfully, scratching his nose, "there might be thought a strong chance of its being Archenlandish in origin. The sailors of the treasure fleet, _and_ the majority of the largest pirate fleet, were Archenlanders."

Straining to make out the few faint scrawls on the parchment, he jabbed a long finger. "See, Caspian!" he said absently, oblivious to the horrified snorts of Trufflehunter and Trumpkin loitering forgotten at the Council Chamber door, to whom the small informality was scandalous. "They _are_ right about its being a chart - that must be a headland - see!"

"Can someone not tell me who _Anna_ is, and what her _treasure_ might be?" wailed Celesta helplessly. Caspian turned an absent-minded smile her way.

"My Lord Drinian can tell the tale best of those present," he said. "Aye, be about your business, Trumpkin - my thanks for your wise counsel, Trufflehunter. Now, sit down, everyone - careful of that, Edmund, if it _should _be a treasure map, 'tis a thing not lightly to be tossed about! At your leisure, Drinian, we shall have the tale of the Fair Maid of Terebinthia and the lost treasure of King Ram."


	3. Chapter 3 Drinian Spins a Yarn

Author's Note: This chapter spawned the whole fic. I wrote it ages ago as a sailors' tall tale for Drinian to tell on Dragon Island as part of my Vingettes from a Voyage fic, then found myself thinking, what if... Now, I'm not entirely happy with it, but here goes! In my head, Ram the Ancient is probably the great-grandson of King Cor and Queen Aravis.

Thank you Bundibird for your kind and encouraging reviews!

_**Drinian Spins a Yarn**_

The three children squeezed together on the single low couch while Caspian perched on the arm of his Queen's chair. Drinian considered for a moment, then plucked his wife from her seat and sat heavily down, drawing Daniela onto his lap. "It happened many hundreds of years ago, Your Majesty," he said, addressing himself to the only member of the party not acquainted with the tale he had to tell. Lightly playing with the unruly lock of dark hair that curled, regardless of his comb's commands, across his forehead, Daniela snuffled her agreement.

"At a time," Drinian continued, "when the realm of Archenland was the richest, greatest and most powerful of all the world's kingdoms. Her treasure houses burst with gold and silver objects. More diamonds, emeralds and rubies were lodged within her borders than were owned by all the other lands of the Known World--" this to a Narnian queen from an island only recently charted by her subjects "--together. All this vastness was ruled over by the longest-reigning sovereign ever known: King Ram.

"This Ram had reigned more than ninety years; not a subject of his dominions could recall another king. More by good luck than judgement his years had been peaceful, and to this day the bards of our neighbour sing of his time as their Golden Age. But over the splendour there hung a shadow, one that darkened with the years. For, though thrice married to ladies of exalted birth, Ram had no heir.

"The wise, that knew better than to credit tales of their master's immortality, looked to the future with concern. And Ram, though hardly the cleverest ever to wear a crown, knew it and feared with them."

He paused, considering his audience's intent faces. Satisfied of their attention, he pressed on in the low, rhythmical tones of the natural storyteller.

"Thus he decided, almost forty years after his third wife's death, that he must marry again. Emissaries were despatched through all the Known lands to cry the news. And from the list of potential brides they gathered, Ram chose to honour one Anna, daughter to the King of Terebinthia, with his proposals.

"This Anna had seen scarce eighteen summers, and was held to be the most beautiful girl in the world. She was - understandably, as I'll say before Queen Lucy can - reluctant to consent to marriage with a man the best part of a century her elder, even for all the jewels the Consort of Archenland might enjoy. Her father had few such scruples.

"When approached by Ram's ambassador, he confessed a becoming degree of reluctance: Anna was, he declared, the light of his declining years (he was many decades, of course, younger than her suitor) and he was loath to let her pass beyond the sea. However, should His Archenlandish Majesty not consider it too bold of a modest man, he would assent to the marriage, at a price.

"If the ancient King of Archenland would send half the treasures of his realm, the Terebinthian declared, he would give his only daughter in return. And Ram - though many of his subjects objected that no bride could be worth beggaring a kingdom for - was so inflamed by the prospect of making the famous beauty his wife that he consented, and began immediately to prepare for the girl's arrival.

"A new galleon, named the Fair Maid o' Terebinthia in her honour, was laid down. With the three lords of Archenland closest in his councils, Ram passed hours of the summer days beneath ground in his enormous treasure chambers selecting the choicest of his possessions to be given in return for the one he desired most: the Lady Anna herself."

"Poor child!" murmured Celesta. Lucy, resolutely resisting the urge to abuse the heartless King of Terebinthia for selling his daughter, nodded vigorously.

Drinian smiled at the ladies' unanimous opinion. "It so happened," he continued, shifting Daniela to a more comfortable position where her head could rest against his shoulder, "that the three lords favoured by Ram - the Ancient, never the Wise - were three of the most avaricious men in the kingdom. The Lords Barin, Topazio and Haslin had risen high (and been greatly rewarded) in his service. And each man would - though 'tis little enough to their credit - have continued so, had not the sailing of the treasure fleet offered a bold man the opportunity to seize half his master's wealth for himself."

The Queen expelled a tiny hiss of horror, the fingers that had been limp against Caspian's cheek flexing to leave the tiniest scrape against his carefully-shaven skin. Hardly realising what she did, she rubbed the offended area with the pad of her index finger.

"The seas between Archenland and the Fair Maid's island were, of course, hazardous. Pirates and wreckers might slip from any cove or any bay, and the King had made no secret of his preparations. A shrewd man might easily take advantage of the fact. So, even as they sought to press ever more extravagant tokens on Ram as suitable for Terebinthia, each lord made, under cover of night, his own plans."

The sun had begun to sink, making the room grow chilly. Not wishing to disturb the servants or halt Drinian in his storytelling, Caspian slipped from his perch and attended to the fire himself, while Edmund locked the open window that had allowed a soft breeze to ruffle their hair. Drinian waited until they were seated again before returning to his tale.

"The Lord Barin held the most favourable position: Lord Admiral of Archenland, he was a fine sailor, appointed to command the treasure fleet. He was also the kinsman - cousin or half-brother, none seems sure - to the most notorious of the northern pirates: one Barosio, who commanded (in a roundabout way) eighteen sail. To Barosio did Barin send his plan. The fleet would beat against the prevailing southerly currents off the Winding Arrow River, tacking north round the archipelago of islands clustered there before striking east for Port Terebinthia, then as now the island's capital on the sheltered western shore, intending to pass the signpost to Terebinthia, the Thirty League Rocks, around the fourth day. Nor' east of the rocks Barosio would lurk, ready to sweep down on the prevailing summer winds and seize the treasure. Barin promised his kinsman an equal share of the booty, and (though he doubtless had plans of his own) that, Barosio claimed, he would accept.

"The Lord Topazio, who had once served his master as ambassador to the court of the Tisrocs, sent word to a blackguard he had encountered in Tashbaan: Arok, the Terror of the Southern Seas, whose eighteen ships sailed under a plain banner kept bright, it was said, by regular drenching in blood fresh from the throats of his victims."

"Ugh!" said Eustace. Queen Celesta shivered.

Caspian draped a reassuring arm over her shoulders. "Most unpleasant," he agreed.

"Arok readied his fleet immediately. What manner of accord was offered from Topazio no man knows, but the lure of the greatest booty ever sent to sea was sufficient to stir the cut-throat. He steered his ships from the Bight o' Calormen to lie off the mouth of the Winding Arrow. It was his intention to shadow Barin's ships until they reached the Rocks, a place notorious then as now for its wild seas and coral reefs, where many an unwary mariner has come to grief. Once the treasure ships were safe past those dangerous waters, he would strike.

"As to the Lord Haslin, he sought the aid of a Terebinthia native - one of the countless score of villains that island has harboured, his name never recorded. Though a smaller fleet - thirteen swift schooners and two brigs - he would have the advantage of home waters in which to sail. The Terebinthian agreed to put out from port on the anticipated sailing of the treasure fleet. Looming into Barin's sight from the sou' western coves, it would dash his hopes of a clean run into port, cause panic among his sailors, and steal the treasure from under the very nose of the greedy King."

"Served him right!" muttered Lucy. Edmund rolled his eyes at the storyteller.

"Well, the great day dawned," Drinian went on, blithely ignoring all the interruptions. "King Ram stood, supported by Topazio and Haslin (for he could barely stay upright an hour without help) to watch the greatest treasure ever entrusted to the sea leave his shores. There were many, he knew, to whom the fleet's going was a source of regret, but he was serene. Aboard the galleon named in her honour would be returned the only jewel the richest of the world's kings craved, the Lady Anna herself.

"Aboard his flagship, Lord Barin, too, was content. Into his plans he had long since brought his deputy, the sailor Zarn, with promise of great reward for his connivance. As night fell, and the Fair Maid of Terebinthia struggled with her companions around the northern tip of the islands, the two plotted their luxurious futures. Like his cohorts ashore, Barin believed that mere days stood between him and the greatest wealth ever to fall into the hand of a single man."

He ceased speaking. In fact, he was quiet so long that Lucy began to wonder if he had forgotten the rest of the story. Daniela lifted her head from its comfortable pillow to study him quizzically. With an apologetic smile, he gathered up his thoughts and pressed on.

"All was peaceful for three days, and the fourth morning found the five ships - three galleons and two huge carracks (floating platforms for war catapults, as Your Majesties would know better than I) - steering well north to evade the treacherous reefs. At dawn, Zarn sent the flagship's lookouts aloft. And the hail came, the one he and his commander had anticipated. Strange sail in sight!

"Barin gave the orders his men would expect, sending a flurry of signals to the halyards. Barosio had changed his plans, he thought, and chosen to struggle up from the depths of the Calormene Bight in pursuit of the flotilla. There again, has his kinsman been any sort of sailor, he would never have had cause to become a pirate!"

Eustace sniggered. Drinian winked at him.

"The treasure ships gathered; the great catapults were lashed to the decks with stacks of chiselled ballast stones piled by in readiness. Aboard every ship the archers were sent to fighting top and taffrail alike, and all sail was set. Then came the hail that identified the pursuing fleet.

"Flying from the masthead of the leading schooner was not the crossed cudgel and cutlass of Barosio, but the bloody banner of the Terror of the Southern Seas. Calormene Arok!"

Though he had expected the news, Edmund felt his heart begin to pound. The Queen gasped leaning forward with her great ocean-coloured eyes fixed on the impassive face of the narrator.

"Barin's feigned panic was, quite suddenly, very real. Though he was fighting the weather to pursue the flotilla, Arok's ships - all with oars, and a dozen extra villains each to row them - made ominous speed. Barin had no choice but to pile on all sail, running direct for the nearest point o' land, Adder's Head at the toe of Anna's island rather than the more sheltered waters of Port Terebinthia

"As the swift galleons, which bore the bulk of the treasures, made good their escape, dozens of archers loosed a first flight of arrows from the carracks, while the catapults creaked and their shot arched toward the first pirate ships. Then more masts were sighted, looming out of the spray. Barosio's rabble, to the great relief of his kinsman aboard the flagship, hove into sight, hard on the wind and running down from the uninhabited bays on the south-eastern side of Terebinthia.

"Now these two villains, Barosio and Arok, were mortal enemies, Your Majesties. At the sight of the other, each was diverted from thought of booty by a more pressing motive: that of bloody revenge.

"Piling on all sail, the Archenlander's schooners struck into the larboard side of the Calormene horde."

One always knew, Lucy thought, when a sailor was thoroughly caught up in the tale he told. The mariner's term slipped out where the more familiar (to an audience of landsfolk) word _port_ would be.

"Barin, being the most natural seaman of the commanders, took advantage of his pursuers' squabbles. He drove straight for land then wore 'round and out to sea; then back again, daring the flock of disordered little ships to follow. As the wind rose and the sea began to run high, he led the pirate rabble a fine chase, but naught he did could shake them from his wake. And then, ahead of him he saw the taut sails of Haslin's fleet o' rogues running down from home waters in search of their booty.

"So, Your Majesties, three small fleets of blackguards and bloodstained rogues were snapping at the heels of Anna's treasure ships. Picture now the predicament of our treacherous Lord Admiral! Astern, firing alternately on his ships and each other's, the two most feared pirate commanders of the age. Afore, cutting his course to safety, a rabble of Terebinthians. The weather turning foul; his men panicking. All his high hopes of stealing his master's fortune in ruins."

"One cannot sympathise with him enough, my lord," said the Queen sarcastically. Drinian grinned.

"Indeed not, Ma'am, but Master Barin had far greater troubles. Late in the night, as the Fair Maid of Terebinthia led the chase for safety his faithful deputy, the Sailor Zarn, slipped from his duties to the poop, where the Admiral stood with his hand on the tiller. The moonlight glinted on the blade in his hand a moment, before - with a single blow - it was thrust deep between Barin's shoulders. He slumped, pierced to the heart, across the wheel. A brace of insignificant trifles were not enough for the greedy Mate; he would have the whole of Anna's Treasure, though he must defy a trio of murderers and their cut-throats to secure it!

"The world has never since seen such a sea chase, and all the while arrows sliced through the darkness and great rocks were launched from the catapults, splashing to merge with the spray from a rolling sea. By dawn, King's Ram's proud treasure fleet had the appearance of wallowing hulks and all three pirate hoards were mingled, firing as often on their own as on their foes in the confusion. Arok, the scourge of the southern seas, was dead; like his rival Barosio, he had lost a goodly portion of his fleet. The crippled schooners and sinking brigs, dismasted hulks, trailed as a sorry wake to Anna's treasure: but at first light the blackguards still chasing were given sight of the strangest signal ever raised up a flagship's halyard."

Eustace tossed a fresh log into the fire, its fierce crackle sending a shiver through his companions. Caspian stretched to light a single lamp on the table at his side. When none of them spoke, Drinian continued.

"Zarn, you see, though as cruel and greedy as his dead captain, was not half such a seaman. His sole thought was for the loot in his holds, and to better protect it he gathered his trio of galleons about the warships like ducklings beneath the mother's wings, ordering his men to transfer all the gold and jewels across to them. That in so doing he denied those ships of war the opportunity to do what they were built for, he failed to consider."

"Some kind of idiot," muttered Edmund.

"Aye, King Edmund, but Zarn had been valued by Barin (no less foolish in his way than the King that trusted him) for unthinking loyalty, not seamanship. The remaining pirates, seeing their prey floundering, forgot their petty quarrelling. Twenty-eight schooners and four brigs piled on all possible sail and swept down upon the hapless Zarn.

"It must be conceded, Your Majesties, the villain led his men gallantly in defence of his trapped ships, but, outnumbered and faced by battle-tried, bloody rogues, the honest mariners of Archenland were soon overwhelmed. Stamping on the dead and screaming abuse at the wounded that littered the decks, the survivors of the battle charged the holds, half-crazed for booty.

"But they found not a pearl from a pendant, nor a diamond from a ring. Of the great services of gold and silver plate, the chests of coin and precious stones, not a trace remained to be stolen."

"But - but…" It cheered Eustace to see the composed and clever Star's Daughter as bemused by the stark announcement as he had been. "But Drinian, that is not _possible_! Such treasures can hardly have vanished into the air!"

"They had, Your Majesty," he countered, looking (in his wife's fond opinion) much too pleased with the sensation the dénouement of the tale never failed to create in a new hearer. "The maddened survivors tore through every battered hulk: they tortured the wounded sailors and turned on each other in disappointed fury. When word of the loss reached the King of Terebinthia, he sent out his own fleet to search, as did the Duke of Galma (never one to let the opportunity for plunder slide).

"As to King Ram, well, he died of shock on the shoulder of the unfortunate sent to give him the news. The Lady Anna, delivered from a match she despised, was cast a year later from her father's halls for the love of a gentleman usher. A true love-match, they said: ten children, and never enough food on the table."

"Drinian, _honestly_!" cried Daniela, smacking his hand. Celesta laughed.

"I still say, I thought it was but _nine_ children," muttered Caspian.

"And the greatest treasure ever sent to sea? Well, Your Majesties, no man knows what became of half the wealth of Ram the Rich. It was said there was a map - drawn by the last man that knew the secret of its resting place. But if there ever was such a document beyond the realm of legend, its whereabouts have been concealed as well as the Fair Maid's treasures themselves."

"Until now," breathed Eustace, staring greedily at the cracked and torn parchment cradled in his cousin's hands.

"Perhaps until now," came the cautious response. Three bright young faces flushed.

"It's obviously important," argued Lucy, "to have been hidden in a secret drawer."

"Important, or quite insignificant," Edmund replied, stretching his legs toward the fire. "It might be no more than a centuries-old shopping list!"


	4. Chapter 4 On The Trail

_**On the Trail**_

"It's _got _to be a map!" said Lucy stubbornly. Squinting at the document as Edmund held it to catch the lamp's light, Celesta shook back her loose yellow-gold hair.

"You may see it, Lucy, but I cannot," she said, turning helplessly to her husband. "Caspian, what say you?"

"I - well, it looks like random squiggles, but I suppose it _might_ be a coast," he hedged. "Drinian, you are the navigator, the sailor. What do _you _think - truly?"

The Lord High Admiral of the realm accepted the paper from Edmund, gnawing his full lower lip. "It may be so, Your Majesties. See, _this_ line, where it curves back against itself, might be a headland, and I think - yes, I can feel the indentation in the parchment where the pen has scratched."

"Let me!" Lucy begged, holding up her hand. Placing her finger where his had been, Drinian guided it, and the girl's face brightened. "Yes, I can feel it!" she cried. "Surely we can trace where the line should go, from the feel of it, and use that to find the treasure?"

"Steady on, Lu!" Edmund hated to be a killjoy, but the leap from a few faded lines on an ancient scrap to a cavern glittering with hidden treasure was too much for his tidy mind to make. "Drinian, this _headland_ as you call it; it's jolly unusual, shaped like the muzzle of a snarling cat. Have you ever seen a stretch of coast it might resemble?"

"Not that I recall, Edmund, no."

"Hold hard, mind," said Eustace, sticking out his chin as he only did when he thought he was about to say something remarkably clever. "If the map - if it _is_ a map, for the sake of the wet blankets present - is as old as the treasure story, well, surely the coastline might have changed quite dramatically, what with erosion by the sea and all that."

"Don't show off, Eustace," said Lucy automatically. "It's not polite."

"We could check it against some charts?" Edmund suggested.

All eyes turned to the mariner in attendance. Drinian sighed.

"If you must imagine the all-but impossible, aye, we might. Daniela, if you were to call on the Herringbones, Alicia might have more to tell of that confounded box and its origins."

"And I have little enough choice but to call soon, with your having been fool enough to enter conversation with her!"

"My dear Daniela!" cried Caspian, really shocked. "Would you have your husband and his friends leave a lady of Narnia trapped up a tree?"

"If Your Highness was by the rescuing forced to sit in her overcrowded, overheated parlour listening to her breathless chattering for two hours at a stretch, you would feel as I do!" the lady replied with spirit. "Oh, very well, there's no evading the duty now. I shall call on her tomorrow."

"And these charts, Drinian…"

"The best I have are stored in my cabin aboard the Dawn Treader."

"We could go now?"

"For shame, Master Eustace, have you no thought for the time?"

"There's always a sentry aboard ship when she's moored close in, isn't there?" the boy retorted. Drinian groaned.

"And if you're determined I shall have no sleep tonight, we might easily ride to Lionmead now."

"Excellent!" Caspian clapped his hands in delight. "Drinian, yourself and Daniela must stay as our guests at the Cair tonight, 'tis much too late to be galloping about the countryside…"

"Though the ride to Etinsmere is half that to Lionmead Bay," his friend reminded him tiredly. Caspian sniffed.

"You must always be so _difficult_, old friend! My dear, we must have apartments made ready for our friends directly; and a messenger sent to their excellent housekeeper, that she may safely lock up the manor for the night."

"Your Majesty is most kind." Daniela spoke to forestall the protest she saw forming on her husband's lips. "It _is_ late, and we rose at dawn…"

"You must not await our returning to retire," Caspian commanded firmly. His Queen rose at once.

"I shall attend to the despatch of a swift horseman, and the readying of apartments," she pledged. "Daniela, come with me, I must hear more of this extraordinary creature, Lady Herringbone. Is she truly _batty_, as Eustace puts it?"

"Completely, Ma'am," said her friend devoutly as, with smiles to their menfolk, the ladies departed the chamber. Caspian beamed.

"Well, my Lord Drinian, let's away to our ship," he said, excitement making him reckless. "We have a treasure map to decipher!"

* * *

They rode at top speed, hugging the coast to reach the tiny hamlet of Lionmead at the head of a wide natural bay where the expanding Narnian fleet rested at anchor. Their horses (Eustace complained loudly of the bumping with every stride his stolid mount took) they tethered to iron hooks along the wharf before clambering into a single rowing boat, left tied at the quay in readiness for the fleet's commander to go aboard in the event of an emergency.

The madcap search for a headland that might not exist did not, to Drinian's practical mind, amount to any such thing, but there was no reasoning with his companions, and the moonlit gallop through the balmy night air was exhilarating. He steered a steady course, setting Caspian and Edmund to man the oars, for the royal galleon swinging idly on anchors fore and aft, noting with approval the tight reefing of her sail and the single lamp burning high on the forecastle where the night sentry stood. Under his breath he counted off the seconds, measuring the small boat's distance at the moment of the panicked hail. Any moment… now!

"Who comes?"

"At ease, Peridan, and cast down the sideropes!" he called back good-naturedly. They all heard the frenzied scuffling above as the sailor scrambled to oblige his captain, throwing a flimsy rope ladder over the port bow. Leading the party up onto deck Drinian tossed off a salute, quick to put the alarmed man's mind at rest.

"Their Majesties desire a sight of my best charts, Peridan, and care naught for the inconvenience of the hour," he said, accepting the lantern the man proffered. "We'll be in the cabin as short a time as may be: and well done. Your conscientious performance of a tedious duty will be remembered."

"Aye, Captain. Thank 'ee, Sir." The lookout returned to his post, peering into the still night and pondering only a moment on the odd ways of royalty.

Drinian hurried them into the austere cabin beside the poop which he occupied at sea, lighting a second lantern that hung by the door from the one he carried. Four windblown heads bent over his desk as he unrolled first one chart, then another, laying them out with the curled edges held down by two flat and polished pebbles.

"Taking account of the probable origin of cartographer and chart," he said, dipping his dark head to the level of theirs, "I'd wager on _this_ being the likely location of our distinctive headland; here, off the mouth of the Winding Arrow, there are scores of small islands, some of 'em not more than isolated rocks, and all uninhabited. This is the best chart I have, that belonged to my father. I doubt any man ever troubled to mark them in greater detail."

"No help to us, then," said Eustace gloomily.

"And one can't pick out a single landmark on this," Edmund agreed. "The snarling cat could be on any of those dots, but we'd never work it out!"

"Perhaps not," said Drinian, smoothing the second map out alongside the first. "Still, if we were to discount the islands off Archenland, this archipelago - the term for a group of islands, Caspian, it ill-becomes a King o' Narnia to display such ignorance! - would be my next guess."

"The islands in the southernmost parts of the Great Eastern Ocean?" Edmund scratched his nose. "But if the treasure landed in Calormene waters, how would the map find its way into an Archenlandish sewing box?"

"And what does it matter to us anyway?" wailed Lucy. "Even if that horrid scrap of parchment _is_ the Anna's treasure map, we're never going to find it! Oh, I know, Ed, it's lovely to dream, but even if we _have_ got the original map, it's no use to us at all!"

They were all so thoroughly woebegone that Drinian had to laugh. "There seems to me only one way to test our speculations, Your Majesties," he choked, trying to calm himself under their scandalised stares. "We shall have to cruise the islands themselves, looking with our own eyes for a point that resembles an ill-tempered feline!"

"Could we?" said Lucy, awed.

"Should we?" asked Eustace.

"When can we?" demanded Edmund, barely containing the urge to dance around the crowded cabin.

Caspian looked from one bright, hopeful face to the next, before turning his serious gaze to the amused one of his oldest ally. "You cannot suggest, my Lord Drinian, that we take the Dawn Treader uninvited into the territorial waters of our nearest neighbour and, all banners flying, scour the countless islands in her possession for a possibly mythical _snarling cat_?"

"The Dawn Treader may be a touch conspicuous for such a purpose, Sire, and the Royal Banner would assuredly draw unwanted attention even from the dullards that man King Corin's fleet. But - if you're all so adamant there's a treasure to be found thereabouts - our only hope of actually discovering it must be to search the likely area ourselves."

"It has been our intention for some time that our Queen be made familiar with the southern parts of our realm," Caspian began, the twinkle in his eyes belying the formality of the words. "If we were to occupy the Royal Lodge south of Glasswater …"

"You two are plotting!" accused Eustace, watching matched smiles break out across two handsome faces. "What brews? Come on, you've _got_ to tell us!"

"And I seem to recall a promise made on our western journey, Drinian, that once we were safe established home, you would attempt to educate a motley assortment of _abominable lubbers _in the mysteries of seamanship," Caspian went on, apparently unheeding of the interruption. Drinian arched a single dark brow.

"Aye, Caspian, I may well have threatened you with that."

It was, he considered, utterly ridiculous. A wild goose chase of the first order.

Yet it was irresistible. The old friends regarded each other for a long moment. Drinian felt his lips twitch.

King and Captain alike broke into raucous, giddy laughter.

"The Lady Elizabetha?" Caspian spluttered.

"Ideal for both purposes," Drinian chortled. "So long as she's commanded by a competent captain. No halyard to bear the Royal Banner…"

"A positive advantage to the preservation of anonymity!"

"A sailing lesson that strays into Archenland's waters?" asked Edmund, his eyes beginning to shine. "Could we? Really?"

"Why not?" demanded the King. "We have had no leisure since our return from the Eastern Sea, and Celesta really _must_ show herself south of Glasswater itself soon. Yourself and Daniela have been continually under the popular eye, Drinian… you would, of course, accompany us to Royal Lodge, lying as it does in your wife's own province..."

"If only for the use of our boat, eh?" The old hunting lodge in open country, as close as Caspian's ancestors had ever dared venture to the shore, was a delightful retreat long prized by the House of Telmar and its friends. Even without the undeniable thrill of a treasure hunt, the prospect of a stay there was appealing. Caspian nodded.

"I shall order the place be made ready tomorrow," he said.

"Later today, more likely," corrected Drinian, stifling a massive yawn. The King contrived to look suitably chastened.

"I forget, you were at your consultation with our master shipwrights before daylight. Come, friends, our gallant admiral wants his bed."

"Your Majesty's consideration overwhelms me," said Drinian. Caspian rolled his eyes.

"You are always sarcastic when tired, old friend. But you may show your proper appreciation for my kindness when we come to tell Trumpkin of our intentions." Leaving Drinian to crush out the lights, Caspian hurried his little party up onto deck, gulping in the clean tang of the night air after the stuffiness of the closed cabin. "Since his regency during the Eastern Quest, he takes the burdens of sovereignty far more seriously than I! Goodnight, Peridan, we shall leave you to your watch in peace."

The sailor had been of the Dawn Treader's company on that great adventure; he was familiar as few Narnians were with the easy condescension of his king, but this midnight descent had startled him. Instinct made him turn his eyes to his commander.

Drinian grinned. "The whims of royalty know no timetables, Peridan," he said lightly. "Goodnight. Now, can Your Majesty manage the ladder, or should I descend first?"

"The senior officer present - to whit, the Lord High Admiral of the Realm - is always the last to leave his ship," Caspian reminded him solemnly as he clambered down the swaying ropes. Everyone laughed.

The whole idea - cruising about a hundred tiny islands, far from Narnia's shore, in search of a treasure that might only exist in the imagination of the bards - was absurd. But Drinian was willing to confess, to himself at least, that he was utterly exhilarated by it.

He must, he decided as he grasped the small boat's tiller and gave the order to his friends at the oars, be becoming almost as crazy as Caspian.


	5. Chapter 5 An Expedition is Prepared

Author's note: This chapter has given me more grief than any other I've written in a while, but here goes! Bundibird and Eruhin, you're both much too kind, but thank you all the same! Hope you enjoy - I'm on a roll now.

_**An Expedition is Prepared**_

Daniela's gentle interrogation of Lady Herringbone took up an entire morning, and the best part of the lively young woman's patience, without obtaining any information that might assist a quest for a treasure island.

"The box was given to Alicia's several-times great grandmother by an Archenlandish suitor, probably a sailor, more than two hundred years ago," she recited, pacing the cosy Queen's Sitting Room overlooking the sea much as her husband was accustomed (Caspian noted, much pleased by the comparison) to stride about the decks of his flagship. "His family were - perhaps - mariners by tradition.

"Alicia values the box for its _romantic history_: she cares nothing for the facts of the matter. She prattled endlessly about her ancestor's pining away for the love of her sailor. For the parchment you discovered, King Edmund, she feels only disgust. How _could_ you bear to handle such an _old_ and _mouldy_ thing?"

The last was squeaked in an accent of sheer horror so far removed from Daniela's poised manner that it had half her audience reduced to helpless giggles. Breaking into her first real smile since she had escaped the Herringbone halls, the lady herself settled on a perch at the edge of her husband's chair. "Now, this holiday Your Majesties have been so kind as to suggest we join… dare I request it be undertaken as a matter of urgency? Three hours of Alicia have frayed my nerves to snapping point."

"Your sacrifice for our great cause will not be forgotten, dear Daniela," Caspian assured her solemnly. The musical laughter of Narnia's second lady rang out.

"Your Majesty is too generous! When do we leave for Royal Lodge?"

"Tomorrow," Caspian decided. "Drinian, the boat…"

"Can be sailed down the coast by two moderately competent mariners. Daniela…"

"Promoted to Mate already," she marvelled, drawing the teasing applause of her friends. "Oh, I know my place, Queen Lucy. I shall never, like Zarn, attempt to usurp the place of my Captain."

"I should think not!" cried the Star's Daughter as the captain himself led their laughter. In high spirits, the party broke up: Drinian and his wife riding for Etinsmere to prepare the sail-boat he had built as a boy with his father; Caspian to his study and the documents Cornelius insisted must be signed at once; and Celesta and the children to the orchard for a stroll and an animated discussion on the best method to be used when searching for a perhaps non-existent treasure chamber.

* * *

Throughout the slow ride south, passing verdant woods and flower-spangled meadows, Trumpkin kept his donkey at the side of his master's bay charger, determined to make his dissatisfaction with the newest example of regal folly plain. "And what's to be done should Calormen attack in Your Highness's absence?" he asked, for the fifth time in an hour. Edmund, who had been anticipating a leisurely amble through the familiar countryside, found himself heartily wishing he might have sailed to Glasswater with Drinian instead.

"The Tisroc has made overtures of friendship since we returned from the Eastern Ocean," Caspian pointed out, keeping his temper with an effort made visible by the clench of his jaw. "Overtures which We, with the full endorsement of the Council - of which I believe your Lordship_ is_ still a member - have returned in kind. What cause has his empire to strike against us this week?"

"No man ever lived long by trusting Tisrocs. Whistles and whirligigs, don't Their Majesties here know that of old?"

"They shan't even know in Tashbaan that Caspian ever left Cair Paravel he'll be home so soon - unless we find the treasure, of course," Edmund reminded him. "It's hardly another voyage to the World's End, D.L.F. and they were quiet as lambs during that!"

"Glad am I Your Majesty made no mention of _mice_ in the present context," murmured Caspian fondly. Lucy smiled sadly.

"How Reepicheep would have loved this expedition," she sighed. Gingerly unwrapping one hand from the reins, Eustace gave her arm a kindly pat.

"Aye." The stern set of the King's features softened. "However, King Edmund speaks wisely, and We had the fullest confidence in Our Regent during those long months at sea. Why! Does not Queen Susan's horn hang in our treasure vaults in readiness for any emergency?"

Trumpkin harrumphed rather more loudly than might be thought appropriate for a subject disputing with his sovereign. "An' Cornelius swears he taught the lad statesmanship," he groused in what was intended as a whisper. "Calls himself a half-blood dwarf! Half-_wit_ might be closer if you ask me!"

"I do not recall, Sir Dwarf, that any one did." Caspian leaked the reproof from one corner of his mouth, careful not to diminish the smile he gave to a family of excited hedgehogs skipping from the bushes to give him three shrill cheers. "And if you've naught better to do on a fine day than grumble and object, you might very well have stayed at the castle."

"Treasure hunting," Trumpkin mumbled, his leathery cheek turned a shade of mottled puce that clashed with the copper fire of his beard and hair under the rebuke. "'s about as fit an occupation for a king as - as…"

"Venturing to the World's End?" Queen Celesta suggested helpfully. The Dwarf grinned, mischief flaring in his black button eyes.

"Beggin' Your Majesty's pardon, but at least His Grace brought something back to make that mad piece o' gallivanting worth the while. Cornelius and the Badger were sure he'd determined never to wed just to spite 'em!"

"Ah, but such a matter as the selection of a bride ought never to be made without great deliberation," Caspian teased.

"Three weeks, wasn't it?" asked Edmund, winking at Eustace.

"Oh, but you had all the time we were sailing from Ramandu's Island to the World's Edge and back, didn't you, Caspian dear?" Lucy objected. Edmund's nose wrinkled.

"Ugh! You're turning into Susan," he complained. Lucy looked alarmed.

"Was that romantic?" she demanded worriedly. "I'm not growing up, am I?"

"Not that much," Eustace promised, laughing. "And anyway, you're right. Drinian swears Caspian thought about you all the way to the World's End and back, Celesta."

"Respond with care, Sire," the Queen advised. Her husband offered a small bow.

"My friend is too perceptive for a self-proclaimed _rough tar_," he parried, urging his mount to a trot as the woodland opened out onto sweeping laws that led to a gracious, honey-gold manor. "Glasswater House at last!"

"Good-oh!" Eustace gave his ambling cob a kick that earned him three reluctant strides at a canter. "If nothing else, Trumpkin, Daniela promised we should have a jolly good dinner tonight. Don't dawdle so, Edmund, I'm famished!"

* * *

They parted company with Trumpkin after an early breakfast, he turning north as they clattered onto the southern pathway, crossing open country to reach the rustic hunting box built by the first King Caspian and extended over centuries by his successors. Backed by rolling hills it offered a glimpse of the glinting ocean from its attic windows, and a narrow footpath led through shady orchards to the small bay where, her anchor dug into the sand, the sailboat Lady Elizabetha awaited her novice crew.

"The current runs southerly all the way to Tashbaan, Your Majesties, and we've favourable winds at this season," Drinian announced cheerfully, rubbing a hand the length of his vessel's new-painted hull. "But - at least until I'm confident you shan't capsize my lady - we shall stay in sight of land, I think."

"Your faith in us is inspiring, my Lord." Drinian made his most courtly reverence.

"Your Majesty did not receive a succession of lectures before leaving the Cair on the capital importance of not drowning a Narnian King," he growled.

"Ah." Caspian bit his lip, and it seemed to Lucy that Daniela was openly smiling. "The same one you heard before the Dawn Treader set sail?"

"Aye." There again, she decided, Drinian too looked more amused than annoyed. "I did suggest Trufflehunter might join our company to watch over us: but he tells me Badgers are not fond of salt water."

"I'm jolly well planning to keep out of it myself, thanks," Eustace told him firmly. "Is she quite safe, just perched on the beach like this?"

"The tides are much lower in these southern provinces. Dig out the anchor and help me haul her down to the water's edge, Caspian - boys. You're still determined, Ma'am, to remain dry-shod?"

"I am, my Lord." Celesta hung back as, grunting with effort, they hauled the boat bodily into gently lapping waves. "However, when your crew are deemed proficient and the Fair Maid's treasure has been found, I shall insist on sailing with you to see it. Daniela, if you are not required to assist in the training of these hapless landsfolk, shall we return to the lodge?"

"Gladly." While Caspian kissed his wife's hand, Daniela shot her husband a mischievous grin. "The Captain must feel himself free to cuss his incompetent crew without fretting for whom he'll offend, Ma'am! There are dry biscuits beneath the oarsmen's bench, Your Majesties, should any one feel a stirring of seasickness."

"In waters flat as any pond?" Never himself afflicted with that complaint, Drinian was notoriously short in sympathy for the less fortunate. "Once she's clear of the bottom scramble in, and touch nothing until I gave the word. Yes, King Edmund, that _does_ include those tails o' rope. They're called rigging, and until you can knot and splice 'em rightly in a howling gale, you dare not name yourself a sailor. Move for'ard, Queen Lucy, I'll take the tiller. All set?"

Their shouts of assent were the last his four companions had breath to offer until nightfall, for inside an hour Drinian was loudly protesting himself defeated by their general incompetence. "I thought the volunteers for the Dawn Treader a lubberly lot, but at least they knew south from east without a fellow guiding their hands," he grunted, yanking the tiller from Eustace's sweaty palm to divert their craft onto her intended course. "And Caspian, the sail is there to catch the wind, not dress yourself in! Really, you may not have had us over yet, but 'tis hardly for the want of trying! Remember, all of you: the oar cuts through the top of the wave; you're pushing us along, not fishing for oysters."

The second day was better. By evening it took them a mere five minutes to reef the sail tight against an impending storm. "As well it was in my head and not those wisps of cloud off the headland," their instructor mused as they flopped in varying states of pained exhaustion before him. "And we're aboard a sailing boat, not a carrack of war."

"Ow! It's all very well for you," Eustace moaned, scowling at the powerful muscles bulging under the sleeves of Drinian's exposed shirt. "We've only got small arms, and all that pulling ropes makes them ache something rotten!"

"Then hauling the ropes will be of lasting benefit to them." Gingerly massaging the upper parts of his own, Caspian gave answer before his friend could form one. "Here, Edmund, a cloth to wipe your brow. And you know perfectly well, my Lord High Admiral, were the weather not set fair you should allow us no farther from shore than Queen Lucy could paddle in safety."

"Likely enough to be true," Drinian acknowledged lazily. "Who wants to steer us ashore?"

Four voices cried out together. "Edmund, then," he decided, abandoning his place in the stern for an oarsman's seat with evident regret. "Caspian and Lucy, unfurl the sail, if you please. Eustace, a sounding from the bows every half minute as we run ashore. You've improved today; I'll make sailors of you all - eventually!"

"Then can we set out for the islands tomorrow?"

"Steady on, Lu, we've not gone beyond the Hare's Muzzle yet," Edmund protested, turning every eye to the narrow outcrop of land to the north which Drinian had set as the limit to their maiden voyages. "All the same, can't we go beyond sight of land tomorrow? We can't get into _that_ much trouble, surely?"

It was a measure of his growing satisfaction with their competence, they all agreed, that Drinian chose not to dispute the point, and over the next two days they stretched far out into deep water. Knotting and splicing the running rig became routine, thought the rope burned hands wet from constant spray and already blistered from long hours on the oars. They took turns at the helm, bringing the Lady Elizabetha onto new courses at her master's order (always unexpected and barked with the same relish he showed on the Dawn Treader's decks, Caspian complained), and accustomed themselves to the difficulties of managing the large canvas sail.

Only once did they come to grief, scrambling to secure the sail against a sudden squall of wind and rain. As Edmund ducked under his sister's arm to snap up a loose tail of rope he cannoned into Caspian, already off balance as he fought to bind a reef knot. On a startled yell the King toppled backward over the side, throwing up a splash that soaked everyone else as he disappeared under the waves.

"Man overboard!" Eustace hollered unnecessarily. "I've always wanted to shout that," he added, quite unrepentant under Lucy's reproachful stare. "What do we do now, Drinian?"

"Boys, hold us steady with the oars." The King was an excellent swimmer, but that knowledge did nothing to quell the panic that surged through his subject's gut. "Lucy, take the helm and _don't_ let her shift off this station. Caspian!"

"Quite safe." He broke the surface a few yards off their starboard bow, shaking himself like a great golden-haired puppy before reaching the side in a pair of powerful strokes to grasp the hand Drinian offered. "Aslan's Mane, I hardly expected it to be so _cold!_"

"The instant he's aboard, put the helm hard over for the shore, Queen Lucy." Fright made the words harsh, but she simply nodded, concentrating on not squirming away while Caspian, ungainly as a porpoise on land in his sodden clothes, clambered over the bow. "Edmund, you'll run ahead to the lodge and have them light a fire in the King's Parlour - and send someone with towels to our mooring! I know the day's warm, Caspian you dullard, but wake with a chill tomorrow and you shan't come treasure hunting in any vessel I command. Here - take my cloak."

"Thank you." Senseless to protest, especially with the wind's subtle slice chilling the wet linen plastered against his skin. Caspian tucked the dark green woollen around himself, willing his teeth not to chatter as the Lady Elizabetha coasted toward the beach. "I'll wager this postpones our journey another day at least, my Lord?"

"Provided Your Majesty agrees not to sniff and sneeze the whole way, I see no cause to delay longer." Pausing long enough for their cheers to die down, Drinian pronounced the highest compliment it was in his power to bestow. "Your Majesties - and you, Master Eustace - will deserve the name of mariners yet."


	6. Chapter 6 Five Friends in a Boat

_**Five Friends in a Boat**_

First light saw them struggling down the sandy spit where the boat was moored, all laden with baskets of food and rolls of blankets. Lucy clambered aboard, Eustace and Edmund seated themselves at the oars amidships and Caspian and Drinian splashed out into the shallows to shove the little vessel until her keel came free of the sand.

Drinian steadied the boat, enabling Caspian to scramble aboard before vaulting into the stern and settling at the helm. "We ought to be back tomorrow evening," he called to Celesta and Daniela, who hovered, just keeping their toes dry, at the water's edge.

"Good luck!" called the Queen, waving vigorously.

"Don't forget, when you find the treasure come back and fetch us!" added her friend.

"We promise!" shouted the three children as Lucy almost tumbled overboard in the excitement of departure. "What do we do now, Drinian?" Edmund added over his shoulder.

"Take the oars with the boys, Caspian," came the immediate reply, drowned by Lucy's shriek at the violent motion the boat made with their shifting of position. "Easy, you'll have us over!"

"All very well for _you_ to complain," answered the King, digging his oar deep through the calm water and creating a most unnecessary splash. "Lounging there playing galley master!"

"If it's all the same to you, Caspian, I'd prefer to know we're being steered by a chap that won't run us into the first coastal outcrop we reach," said Edmund, releasing his grip on the oar shaft sharply as his cousin's overenthusiastic pulling stung his hands. "Steady on, Scrubb! We're supposed to slice through the top of the water, remember?"

"Sorry," huffed Eustace, who was beginning to turn slightly pink with exertion. "I say, we don't have to _row_ all the way, do we?"

"Both the current and the prevailing winds - such as they are - favour a southerly course," Drinian reminded him, lazily trailing one hand out of the boat and through the silky cool of the waves. "Now, can you set full sail, or must I do everything myself?"

Four howls of outrage greeted the question, and for the next five minutes the expert mariner was able to lay back in fits of laughter as they tripped an ungainly dance around the stout mast, most of their newly learned knowledge forgotten in their excitement. "Eustace, do you intend to hang Caspian?" he cried, when the boy contrived to wrap a tail of the rigging that ought to have been safely tied away around the other's neck. "Lion bless me, I should have done it myself! Nobody move!"

In a trice he had disentangled Caspian and unwrapped Edmund from the body of the sail. "Lucy, take the tiller and stand ready; she'll fairly spring when the wind catches her," he instructed. "Now, _if_ you're quite finished trying to shred an almost-new sail, we can begin again."

"Oh" cried Lucy, as the great creamy sheet gave a bang, curving out before the force of the prevailing breeze. "She's alive!"

"And there's a comment to touch a sailor's heart," said Drinian, taking her former seat in the bows. "Can you hold her steady on this course? Don't scowl, Eustace; there's time enough for everyone to have his turn at the tiller."

The promise was kept. Every thirty minutes the helmsman was changed; when ever the conditions required it, Drinian set a different person the task of trimming the sail. "You, my Lord, are enjoying this," Caspian accused him.

"Seldom do I have the chance to enjoy the sea without working," agreed his friend, stretching a long arm for the first picnic basket. "Anyone else care for an apple? All right, all right, I'm not as deaf as all that! You'd think I was at the other side o' the country, Eustace!"

By the time they had munched their apples the bulk of Stormness Head could be clearly discerned inland, the peak shrouded in steely cloud. "Almost there!" cried Lucy joyfully.

"Only half way there, as a matter of fact," Caspian corrected, before Drinian could open his mouth. "I happen to know that the Archenlandish Archipelago is at least as far again as we've come so far."

"Well done, Caspian. Edmund, take us a degree or two more starboard; we're too near the shore for my taste."

"I can't see the coast!" the boy protested, even as he obeyed. Drinian grunted.

"What do you take that bluish blur there for? Calormene mist?"

Carefully, Edmund edged the Lady Elizabetha's bow further east. The sail clapped and slapped against the mast and the little vessel surged anew in response. "Better?"

"Aye. There's always the risk of wreckers lying in wait for lone vessels that steer from the safety of Narnian waters. No offence to your cousin intended, Caspian, but his subjects are miserable laggards when it comes to protecting their own seaways."

"I shall make a point of reminding Corin of that, my Lord," said the King solemnly. "Is it my turn to steer yet?"

"I suppose so." With great reluctance Edmund shuffled from his perch, and for a split second the ship wavered before a new hand could steady the helm. "Just remember, there's no need to go yanking her about; she's not exactly a big lumbering carrack."

"I take sufficient orders from one captain, King Edmund," said Caspian with mock dignity. "I have no requirement for instruction from as paltry a mariner as myself! Do we remain on this heading, Drinian?"

"Aye, Sire. Hold a true course until I tell you otherwise. Now, shall we spin some yarns to pass the time? Someone else, mind - I've no desire to set off two treasure hunts in a week!"

In telling stories (Lucy told of the first visit to Narnia, carefully omitting anything that might have made her brother cringe) and singing they passed the early afternoon, remaining just beyond telescope range of the shore. It seemed to Caspian barely half an hour had passed since Stormness Head dropped astern when Edmund, on forward lookout in the point of the bows, let out a delighted hail. "Land! Look, dead ahead!"

Barely visible on the southern horizon they saw it, less than a mile across and rising barely fifty feet from the water; the most northerly islet of the Archenlandish Archipelago. Behind and around it as they sailed closer they could just make out the scrub-covered dots of its companions. "Now what?" demanded Eustace.

"We cruise around 'em, looking for the snarling cat," said Edmund, as if it were perfectly obvious (which, to Lucy it was). "Good grief, it'll take a week! There are _scores_ of them!"

"Most of 'em small enough for us to round inside half an hour," Drinian assured him. "Lucy, are you content to retain the helm? Between the islands we may navigate shallows, and some of the channels are narrow."

"I'm all right," said the girl stoutly. "But - if I start to panic…"

"I shall assume command. No novice mariner can be expected to have mastered the steerage of so much as a coracle inside a week."

"I'll wager _he_ managed it," muttered Caspian, only half in jest.

"Ah, but I'm an Etinsmere, Caspian; sea water in the veins and born cussing like a hardened tar. Lucy, swing us a point to starboard! See where the water lightens, close to the port bow? The seabed must rise there; cast out the lead, Edmund, I fancy we'll find sand and gravel fathoms nearer the surface than we should like."

"I can't see anything," both children protested as they obeyed their instructions, and found, to nobody's great surprise, that their captain was right on all questions. "Is that - oh, no, it's just an ordinary rounded headland," Lucy added, dropping the finger which had been raised to point. "I suppose it'd be a channel into the shore that would give the cat its mouth, Drinian?"

"Most likely. Aye, surrender the helm to Edmund now; it'll do no harm for you all to manage the boat around treacherous shoals. If that's the water flask you're opening, Caspian, pass it around; that sun is scorching!"

In turn Edmund moved aside to grant a turn at steering to Eustace. And as the sun began to sink toward the western horizon, that young gentleman, never the most patient, was declaring himself ready to abandon the search. "It was probably somebody's old doodle and not a treasure map at all," he groused.

"That's not what you were saying this morning," Edmund objected while Lucy tried to explain what a _doodle_ was to two confused Narnians. "Hadn't we better start thinking about making camp? It's starting to get chilly, and I'm famished."

"If we were to cruise that larger group of islands to the south east," suggested Caspian, waving at a succession of more sizable islets that stretched across the southern horizon. "There appears to be more cover - even trees on some of them. Swing the bow that way, Eustace!"

King of Narnia he might be, but Caspian's order had to be confirmed by a quick nod from his neighbour on the oarsmen's bench. Obligingly Eustace turned the Lady Elizabetha's bow, cutting her through a narrow channel of deep water toward the cluster of bigger islands, close together and all covered with richer vegetation than the scrubby bushes of their neighbours. "I say!" he exclaimed suddenly, jerking up so fast the boat rocked alarmingly. "Doesn't that look like a mast, just poking over the hill to the west there?"

"Where?" Caspian too stood, shielding his eyes from the setting sun. Drinian dodged around him to seize the tiller from Eustace's slack grasp.

"It _is_ a mast," he said sharply. "Caspian - boys - take the oars. Lucy, stand by with that lead; we'll need to know the depth beneath us at all times, should they be keeping as sharp a lookout as we ought to have been!"

"We have no reason to imagine they might be any more hostile than we ourselves, my Lord!"

"And no inclination to take chances, Sire." It was, Lucy thought, instinctive: when Caspian questioned his friend's opinion, _Drinian_ became _my Lord._ Equally, when he suspected the smallest threat to his sovereign, _Sire_ and _Your Majesty_ replaced the more familiar _Caspian_ on Drinian's lips. "If we _should _have to run, I'd sooner know we're ready!"

"If we're going to, it'll be soon," Edmund said, his knuckles whitened by his deathly grasp on the oar. "They're rounding the island - coming our way!"

"Aye. Caspian, keep your head down and your face forward. If any one of us is likely to be identified through a glass, it'll be the reigning King o' Narnia."

The vessel - a schooner, Edmund noticed, of flowing line and unpatched sail - swept around the westernmost point of the island, her bow wave creaming as she turned directly toward the unarmed Lady Elizabetha. An eddy of breeze stirred the banner that had hitherto hung limp at her masthead. Drinian let fall a sharp cry.

"Pull for your lives! Lucy, keep the lead swinging: boys, as you pull the oars, keep your eyes open for a rocky collar around an island, or a cave - anything we can take shelter in or athwart!"

"What ever is the matter?" cried Lucy, really frightened. "Who are they?"

His mouth drawn into a tight, hard line, Drinian answered as succinctly as any of them could wish, and the single word chilled the blood of all his shocked companions.

"Pirates."


	7. Chapter 7 Pursuit!

_**Pursuit**_

"Have they seen us?" Lucy asked in a small voice. The muted sound of a hoarse yell and the sibilant hiss of arrows leaving string in the schooner's bow answered before Drinian could.

"They've seen us," Eustace confirmed flatly. "Bother! And I hate rowing!"

"I prefer it to dying," Edmund countered, trying not to duck from the hail of arrows he knew must be arching their way. Lucy managed a weak giggle. "I wasn't joking!"

"Why chase _us_?" demanded Caspian, leaning deep into his stroke. Drinian grunted.

"Because we're here?" he suggested. "Depth, Lucy?"

"No bottom at eight fathoms." The day's journey and the little time of preparation had not been wasted; she threw out the lead with the sure hand of a practised sailor. "D'you know their banner, Drinian?"

"Aye." In the first moment of fright he had identified the red and white crossed cutlasses on a black cloth streaming from the schooner's masthead. "Black Barwicke, the Tash-benighted devil," he growled, swinging his little craft sharply to starboard and around the needle-thin headland of a bare, flat islet. "We thought - Eustace, tweak the sail a touch more windward, that's right…"

"Barwicke?" The name registered with Caspian, whose blue eyes almost popped. "Was he not thought…"

"Resident north o' Narnia, aye. Lucy, head down, and wrap your cloaks around yourselves, everyone. They're poor shots, but there's such a thing as _villains' luck_ to consider."

"What about you, then?" Still, she obediently dipped her head below the line of the hull as the boys wrapped whatever protection they could find around their heads. "They're closing on us!"

"Hold tightly." The light, fading fast now; the shallow draught and slender shape of the Lady Elizabetha; the fluctuations of a fitful breeze. Even as he took desperate advantage of them, Drinian was assessing the factors that might be in the favour of his unarmed vessel.

"Lucy, I need continual soundings," he instructed hauling the boat onto a new course, one intended to carry her through the heart of the Archenlandish Archipelago, where rugged cliffs would funnel the lightest luff of wind through narrow channels. Though the night would be starry there would be no moon, and though the pirates continued to loose off with their bows the fall of arrows into their wake indicated to Drinian no cause for particular alarm.

"Eight fathoms… no bottom at eight fathoms," Lucy chanted, her voice shrill over the soft plash of the oars and the harsh rasp of the rowers' breathing. "Ow! These channels are getting awfully _thin_!"

"And rocky," Caspian added more than a touch nervously, for the outcrops of rock from the cliffs were looming ominously near in the gathering gloom, and the Lady Elizabetha suddenly seemed much frailer than she had been in full sunlight.

"All the better - look for a cave or some such." With her size and weight the schooner ought to have a sailing advantage: but pirates of all worlds are better fighters than sailors, and the Lord Admiral of Narnia would wager his seamanship against any other man's. "And mind those oars! Smash one against the rocks now and we're lost!"

"Thanks!" His heart was about to burst out of his chest. Edmund's eyes were stinging from the constant dribble of sweat from his brow and every muscle in his arms burned, yet still he forced his oar through the water as if his life depended on it (which was, he reflected a pretty silly figure of speech, since it probably did). Pirates! The very word was enough to make a sensible chap panic.

He envied Drinian. Caught up in his work, coaxing the Lady Elizabetha as a horseman will a reluctant mount, he had no time to feel the terrors that knotted Edmund's innards.

Lucy, with little to do but watch her companions, suspected their helmsman was really rather enjoying the challenge of escape. The Lady Elizabetha danced around the eastern edge of one island, heeling hard to prevent herself running aground on its neighbour. "I think we're pulling ahead!" she shrieked.

"She comes to hand better than a schooner," Drinian asserted, waving with his free hand that another sounding was required. Hurriedly, and rather guiltily knowing she had been too caught up in the chase, Lucy fed out the lead again.

"Ten fathoms!" she cried. "High cliffs, deeper water!"

The sky turned from grey to deepest black; at the schooner's fighting top a lantern was raised, flickering weirdly as it seemed to float in the air. "Why're they bothering?" Edmund gasped, the words hurting his raw throat. "We're carrying nothing!"

"We may be - on their territory," choked Caspian in answer. "If they - Drinian! Look to our left!"

"That's it!" Eustace shot off the bench, almost going overboard in his excitement. "It's the snarling cat! By golly, Caspian, you've found it!"

"_Later_!" If there was a treasure island in this bleak archipelago, Drinian wanted to stay alive and free to find it. "Eustace, back to your oar, unless you'd care to hand Anna's treasure to Master Barwicke! Of course we can find it again in daylight_,_ now keep rowing!"

There was good sense behind his irritated tone, and the three oarsmen responded to it, much to Lucy's relief. The snarling cat was swiftly left behind, the Lady Elizabetha swinging to port, away and around a towering single rock that of itself, she decided, would make a mariner the perfect signpost to his secret loot.

In which case, the mapmaker had probably returned before hiding his precious parchment, and they were getting chased by bloodstained villains (_blackguards_, she reminded herself) for no purpose.

Not, she realised a few breathless, bewildered minutes later, that she could have found the pinnacle of rock or the snarling cat again after riding the zigzag of a course through the islands that Drinian had invented. "Oh, how much longer?" she squealed.

"Look!" Edmund this time, barely forcing the word through his laboured breathing. "Is that a tunnel - look right, Drinian, see!"

"Aye." Too late to investigate this time, and the pirates too close to put the helm over hard. Around the island, into the faster flowing current that chased down a narrow corridor of sea, sharply back and around. "Boat the oars! Brace against the sides! There's no way to know how deep the water runs in there!"

No time to question the wisdom of plunging blindly into a tiny cavern worn through the cliff face by the waves. Certain he wouldn't hear the scrape of keel on rock above the grinding of his own teeth, Caspian offered up the briefest of prayers for Aslan's protection as the canopy of sky disappeared and the Lady Elizabetha was, after a fashion, swallowed up by the glinting grey walls of the nameless island.

There was no horrible crunch of rock gouging the planking beneath them; no sound at all, save their own ragged breathing (much too loud, Eustace thought stupidly) and the gentle lapping of the water against the shore. Frightened to move, much less to speak, they waited, straining their ears for the swoosh of the schooner sliding past.

When it came Lucy found herself actually shrinking back, as if making herself as little as possible might make the Lady Elizabetha's bulk less obvious to the sharp-eyed. They heard a coarse voice bellow a word they couldn't quite make out; saw the sleek shape of the pirate vessel, her bow wave and wake shining silver against the inky hue of sea, cliffs and sky as she passed. Then at last blessed silence possessed their tiny corner of the Archenlandish Archipelago, and everyone could breath a little easier.

"Have they gone?" Caspian managed to croak after a minute that, to Eustace, seemed to last an hour. Close by he felt the air stirring as his neighbour, Edmund, nodded.

"I think so," his voice confirmed. "But I dare say we're trapped here for the night; we can't go blundering about in the pitch dark, not knowing exactly where that confounded schooner's gone."

"Not quite how we thought to camp," Drinian agreed as Lucy began to pass around blankets to ward off the cold. "You'll find the baskets beneath your bench, Caspian, and we've ample time for dinner! Were his lookouts to have identified Your Majesty, Barwicke would search all night for us, but if not… we're too small a vessel to be carrying valuable cargo."

They took full advantage of the fine assortment of sandwiches, cold meats, cheese and fruit that had been packed for their journey. In a silence broken only by the gentle plashing of water against the boat's side each sipped their choice of water, wine and ale. And with the exertion of rowing and the immediate fear of capture and arrow shot behind him, Edmund made two discoveries: first, he was ravenous; and second, remembering was far more frightening than actually doing had been.

Lucy, on the other hand, found the quietness into which they were sunk marvellous. "We might be the only creatures in the world!" she murmured.

"Save for Barwicke and his mob." Though it was too dark to be sure, she rather thought from his voice that Drinian was scowling.

"Could he have been lurking amongst these miserable islands all the while?" wondered Caspian. "All the reports… all the survivors of Barwicke's raids swore he descended on them from the north!"

"The few survivors," Drinian cut in grimly. "Aye, Sire. There are half a hundred islands could shelter a lone schooner hereabouts, and the bays of Etinsmoor are no better isolated from the trade routes than these central ones. But when we suggested they gave too much credit to the direction of the attack, didn't our laggardly neighbours become defensive?"

"As you never did, my Lord, when it was suggested your confidence in Narnia's coastal security might be _misplaced_," the King suggested, too innocently.

"Defensive? I?" The muffled sniggers of his companions were overlaid by Drinian's own hearty laughter. "I merely pointed out that our seas are properly patrolled. Aslan's Mane! Is it coincidence not one of Barwicke's crimes was committed in Narnian waters?"

"One of our merchants was seized as he tacked toward the Barwell Roads," Caspian remembered sadly. "The master was slain, with most of his crew; only the Dwarf, Popkin, survived to report to us at the Cair."

"And his report was the most detailed we have," Drinian agreed. "As well as providing Narnia with a reason to concern itself with Master Barwicke's activities."

"He means, providing the Narnian Fleet with an excuse to play its part in the villain's capture," Caspian translated needlessly. "Knowing of course that he shan't trust my Cousin Corin's fleet to manage the matter themselves."

"Wouldn't trust 'em to catch an old dame in a leaking barrel, Sire, much less one of the world's most ruthless brigands," came the immediate reply. "We ought to make for Barwell - once we've discovered the treasure, King Edmund, no need to groan, I don't forget it - gather a force and strike, before Barwicke sleeps off the effects of his latest carousing. The Admiral of Archenland won't give difficulty: appointed last year, he's a lubber like his predecessor, but at least he knows it."

"Then the Dawn Treader can lead the capture under the command of the Narnian Admiral, and there'll be no protest from our neighbour." Caspian rubbed his hands. "I tell you plainly, I was chilled to the marrow by poor Popkin's account of his shipmates' slaughter; and that the villains approached him under the flag of friendship, raising their bloody banner in place of Archenland's--"

"White cross on a white ground," muttered Drinian and Edmund in unison. Lucy caught up her wayward giggle and turned it into a squeak.

"Now don't be cruel!" she rebuked them, to no very great effect Eustace thought. "It's an old trick, Caspian; so long as you run up your true colours before opening fire…"

"Or the moment the first arrow leaves your bow if you've a pirate's notion of honour," Drinian amended. Caspian sighed.

"My Lord Drinian has too much experience of friend Barwicke's kind," he said, almost apologetically. "The Terebinthian war…"

"We had some experience of piracy in our own days too, Caspian. You needn't fret for our tender sensibilities," Edmund assured him. "So; we find the treasure, set all sail for Barwell and summon a squadron of Narnian ships to corner Barwicke's mob. Sounds like a plan to me!"

"And one we shall need to be fresh to carry out," said the King. "There's no cause for setting a watch, Drinian?"

"I think not, Sire. And yes, I can find our way back to your blessed _snarling cat_ in daylight, so be kind enough not to ask it!"

Eustace shut his mouth with an audible snap, his intended peevish question decidedly answered. Very soon complete silence possessed the low-roofed cavern. The Lady Elizabetha, swaying like an oversized hammock, rocked her passengers into deep and dreamless sleep.


	8. Chapter 8 Treasure Island?

_**Treasure Island?**_

Daylight stole as if unwilling into their shelter. The first rays of light tickling her eyelids roused Lucy. "Oh!"

"Wha'? Where?" Caspian's sputterings woke the rest. "Oh! Good morning, Queen Lucy - gentlemen. Aslan, my back aches!"

"If you've slept in that position, I'm not surprised," said Edmund, though it was noticeable he took particular care in untwisting from his own awkward-looking ball in the corner. "Ouf! Everyone all right?"

"Starving," said Eustace.

"Can we go and find the treasure island now? Oh please, can't we?" cried Lucy.

"Steady on!" exclaimed Edmund, clutching the side of the boat as she rocked with his sister's bouncing. "Let's at least _eat_ first; and don't forget, those pirates might still be about."

"Almost sure to be," Drinian agreed allowing himself a curious glance around their shelter. "Lion bless me, I'm thankful it was so dark when I steered us into this!"

"Glory!" Their masthead grazed the roof, shearing off layers of paint as the vessel swayed. "You'll have to touch up the top, Drinian!"

"Aye, but the view above's more pleasing than that below, King Edmund," said the sailor solemnly. Four tousled heads peered over the sides.

The faces that turned back to him were white and popping-eyed. "I see what you mean," said Lucy faintly. "We're almost _sitting _on the rocks, and they look jolly sharp, too."

"And a twitch of the tiller would have seen us smashed against the walls." They had to get back out yet, and now he saw the difficulties Caspian was not looking forward to the attempt. He shuddered, imagining a horrible screeching crack as the Lady Elizabetha's planks - stout Narnian oak, but how fragile against the jagged granite teeth protruding from the seabed just below? - sheared apart. "Had there been light enough to see what we risked, my Lord Admiral, I might have sooner have taken my chance with Pirate Barwicke than enter this cave!"

"As well we didn't know, then," said Edmund warmly. "What's left of the food? We'll face getting out again better on full stomachs."

Nonetheless their breakfast of ham, cheese and fruit lay heavy in their bellies when, with Eustace and Lucy keeping the sail wrapped tight around the mast and Caspian and Edmund ready with the oars to stall any sideways drift when the Lady Elizabetha caught the current, Drinian gave a tug of the tiller and the little craft began to inch her way backward into the morning's silver light.

Lucy screwed up her eyes and ground her teeth. Edmund, though he needed both hands to hold his oar upright against the pressure of the tide, desperately wanted to stick fingers into his ears, as if by not hearing the sound of wood grinding on rock he might prevent the Lady Elizabetha's destruction. For what felt like an age the boat crept back until, safe in deeper water, she could be turned southward. Then her sail was let go, and her anxious crew relaxed.

"All right," said Eustace, with only the faintest trace of a tremor in his voice. "Which way to Treasure Island, Drinian?"

"South-west, through the very heart of the archipelago, Eustace. We'll barely need the oars! Keep watch for that damnable schooner, mind."

"I hope Barwicke hasn't got to Anna's treasure first," said Lucy worriedly. "I mean, if he's made his base here…."

"Had a blackguard discovered such a haul, Ma'am, he'd hardly keep his own counsel," Drinian assured her, leaning over to tweak the guide ropes of the sail a touch. "No, if Anna's Treasure found its way to these islands, it's still here. Take a sounding, Eustace; Caspian, secure that rope aft before the sail swings round and knocks Edmund overboard! We ought to sight the needle larboard of the snarling cat inside the hour, if this wind holds."

* * *

Sure enough, fifty minutes (according to Eustace's watch) later, Lucy and Caspian cried out in unison. "Look!"

"That's the tall rock we almost ran into," Edmund confirmed with a wink to the King. Caspian chortled.

"And look what's behind it!" yelped Eustace. "Look! Beyond the treasure island itself, can't you just see the top of a mast?"

Both Narnians cursed softly. "Surely too far beyond the hill to be anchored on the other side of our island?" asked Caspian.

"Aye; see there, a column of smoke behind the fighting top?" Drinian shaded his eyes, considering the languid curl of white steam rising to wind around the thin post of the schooner's topmast. "Half a league beyond us, perhaps? Hang it, Caspian! Should the treasure be on this island, hope it lies to the eastern side! We should be spied by any lookout of Barwicke's were we to go clambering around the western shore!"

Rounding the lone needle of black rock, they found themselves confronted with the gaping mouth and rounded skull of their imagined cat point. "Has to be, surely?" said Edmund, sounding more doubtful than he intended.

"The map _is_ awfully old," said Lucy.

"And the lines were really very faint," added Caspian.

"Still, as we're here…" Lucy concluded gloomily.

"Aye, as we're here." While his friends were convincing themselves there was nothing on the hilly, scrubby island but a few rabbits and a chunk of Tash's Gold (we call it _Fool's Gold_ in our world), Drinian had been scanning the eastern coast for a safe anchorage. "Best we can do, Your Majesties, is beach her, I fancy. Edmund, take the tiller; Caspian, Eustace, drive her ashore. Lucy, help me furl the sail. Soon as we're aground we can dig her in."

"There's not much cover," Edmund reminded him gravely as he shifted into the captain's vacated seat. "If Barwicke should send out a patrol…"

"Why should he?" asked Eustace, reasonably enough. "Straight up the beach, Drinian?"

"Aye. That's right, Lucy, haul!"

The big sail was pulled like an oversized window blind up the mast and to the yardarm that crossed at its highest point. Tying off the ropes at deck level to hold it secure, Lucy sat down while Drinian braced himself to splash over the side the instant the boat struck sand. Together the party of five dragged the Lady Elizabetha clear of the water, digging her single anchor deeply into the shingle of a narrow strip of beach. "Well," said Caspian as they straightened, dashing the dampness from his brow. "This is it; Anna's island!"

"What do we do now?" asked Lucy, while Eustace stared helplessly around him as if he had expected to see chests of gold stacked on the shore awaiting collection.

"It'd be quicker to split into search parties," said Edmund. "And the faster we're finished, the less chance of our being spotted by Barwicke's crew."

Lucy joined the two Narnians, who turned north; the boys were left with the southern half of the island, under strict instructions not to shout, and to move with extreme caution should they venture onto the western slope of the two rounded hills that rose down the spine of the land. "What're we supposed to be looking for, anyway?" Eustace wanted to know.

"A cave; the entrance to a passage. How am I supposed to know?" Though the island was small the task began to look hopeless, and the presence of a pirate nearby made Edmund nervous. "We could start by climbing our hill," he continued, regretting his childish words the moment they were spoken. "And remember, no shouting out! If you find anything, hoot like an owl."

"Hmph! An owl at this hour of the day! Oh, that won't make the pirates suspicious at all." If Edmund could be petty, so could he! Both huffing, feeling silly but refusing to admit it, they marched off up the slightly lower of the hills, each determined not to speak until spoken to.

Presently they found themselves crouched just below the highest point, peeking over at the schooner in a snug anchorage with a single cottage behind it (presumably Barwicke's, Edmund thought) from the chimney of which smoke continued to rise. "Ought we go down the other side?" Eustace whispered.

"Not yet; can you see Lu and the others?"

"No."

"There's nothing here; let's go back down." Defeated, Edmund turned and began to slither down the slope. Muttering under his breath, Eustace followed with his head bowed, watching his feet.

Just as he reached the bottom of the hill he heard a most odd sound; half a squeak, half a thump. "Edmund?" he called, startled into looking up. "I say, this isn't _funny_, Pevensie! Where are you?"

For Edmund, right in front of him a moment ago, had disappeared. Eustace felt his heart lurch up into his throat.

"Edmund? Ed?" he whispered, wanting to shout for help but knowing he dared not. "Oh, Lor'! Edmund?"

"I'm here!" The voice, though shaky, was definitely Edmund's, but where was it coming from?

Down? Eustace looked again toward his feet and nearly yelled, pirates or no. There, poking through the solid ground, was his cousin's head, hair standing on end, looking for all the world like a football on the end of Eustace's toe. "They must have some jolly active rabbits on this island," the head announced crossly. "There's the most _enormous_ hole down here, and a proper passageway leading out of it! Don't just stand there gawking, Scrubb! Help me out!"

"A passageway?" Eustace repeated, feeling giddy. "A proper passageway? By Jove, Ed, I think you've found it!"

"Found what? Just - oh!" All the annoyance raised by lingering fright from his fall dissolved from Edmund's belly. "D'you think the treasure might be down here? Golly, what a stroke of luck! The only way anybody could find it would be to do what I've just done and fall in on it! Call the others, Scrubb, there's a good fellow."

Eustace cupped both hands around his mouth and tried to hoot. "Not like _that_!" Edmund complained at the guilty coughing sound that emerged. "Like this!"

He pulled both arms out of the hole and pursed up his mouth. With his hands clasped together to funnel the sound, he hooted.

"Listen!" cried Caspian, jolting back out of the gorse bush through which he was scrabbling. "Ow! I'm all scratched!"

"That's Edmund!" Lucy popped up from behind a large boulder she had been inspecting closer to the coast. "They've found it!"

"Found something," Drinian corrected, emerging from the other side of the gorse patch.

"Or been sighted by the pirates," Caspian suggested. His friends both turned to glare at him. "All right, I'm a _wet blanket_, but it _is_ possible!"

"It sounds to be coming from the hill," said Lucy, determined not to be frightened by what was (surely) a remote possibility. "All right, Ed, we're coming!"

By the time they reached Eustace, who was hopping with excitement, Edmund had completely disappeared. "Well?" demanded Caspian breathlessly.

"There's definitely a passageway," announced a voice from under their feet. As the newcomers jumped back in fright Edmund's head emerged again through the springy turf. "Oh, hullo! Come down; there's masses of space, and the tunnel seems to run for ever!"

"What are you _doing_ down there, King Edmund?" wailed Caspian. The boy gave him an exasperated glare.

"Looking for Anna's treasure, isn't that what we came here for? Come down and see for yourselves. I thought it was a rabbit hole when I fell down it, but there are tool marks on the walls; this has been made by men!"

"The last men to see the Fair Maid's marriage payment?" Caspian marvelled. "Is there room enough for five down there, Edmund?"

"Room enough for fifty, but the roof's a bit low. Let me hold this flap of turf back otherwise you'll never find the entrance."

His head disappeared; a hand came up, twisted awkwardly to reveal a large tunnel cut down through sandy soil and down into the bedrock. "We shall have to mark it somehow when we leave," the muffled voice announced solemnly.

"We'll worry about that later," decided Drinian. "I'll go first, Queen Lucy; then you climb down, and Eustace." He dropped through the hole and whistled. "Aslan's Mane! The roof _is_ low! You and I shall have to crawl along this passageway, Caspian, if it drops any further! Hand down that lantern, will you?"

"It doesn't look _too_ bad," Edmund informed him as the tallest of the party, kneeling, offered up a hand to the next treasure hunter. Soon all five were crouched around the vast bare chamber, blinking in the light of the single ship's lamp that Drinian had remembered to bring along.

"It smells musty," said Eustace, wrinkling his nose.

"I wonder how long it's been since people last stood here?" mused Edmund.

"What a sell for Master Barwicke if the greatest treasure of history should be hidden so near his base!" Drinian murmured, his eyes glinting black and dangerous in the low light.

"Oh, can't we go and explore down the tunnel?" demanded Lucy, clutching at Caspian's hand. He laughed.

"I see no reason why we ought not. Drinian, you and I will lead. Stay close together, everyone."

Led by the two young men, their enormous shadows going before them in the wayward light of the lantern they crept, too excited to talk, along the low, uneven passageway. The children could walk upright; Caspian and Drinian stooped, their shoulders uncomfortably hunched. "I shouldn't have expected it to be as long as this," said the King at length.

"And what's that rumbling noise?" Eustace wanted to know.

"The sea!" Lucy's shrill cry rebounded from the bare walls, making everyone start. "Can't you tell? We're walking under the sea itself, we must be!"

"Is it quite safe?" Caspian didn't think he liked the sound of that.

"Of course it is; were the roof to have collapsed, the whole passage would have flooded long ago," Edmund told him sensibly. "Goodness! What a place to hide a treasure hoard! No wonder it was never found before!"

"It's not been found yet, either," Drinian cautioned, not sounding really certain of that. "Ready to go on?"

Four voices merged in a single sound of agreement. Cautiously, rounding a kink in the tunnel, the two Narnians moved on.

And stopped.

"It's here, then," said Caspian flatly.

"Aye," agreed Drinian, lifting the lamp higher as the sharp raising of the roof permitted him to stand to his full height. "It's here."

"Let's see!" Impatient, Eustace squeezed between them, his mouth falling open as he took in the vastness of the circular chamber filled with wooden chests, stacks of gold and silver and tumbled heaps of glittering jewels. "Oh, my!"

In mute astonishment, not really believing what they saw, the explorers began to wander through the chamber, twice the size of that Edmund had first stumbled into. Everywhere they spied new marvels: a crown of rubies and diamonds; a tankard of solid gold set with pearls; coins of Ancient Archenland, gold and silver, spilling between the rotting planks of the iron-bound chests that had borne them aboard the Fair Maid of Terebinthia all those centuries ago, and all marked with the name and portrait of Ram the Rich. If there had been any doubt whose treasures they were admiring before, there could be none now. It was somehow more than Caspian could quite believe.

"Look at this!" Lucy lifted a broad gold belt, studded with diamonds and edged with pearls, from the floor. "Goodness, it's much too heavy to _wear_!"

"Even Peter's crown as High King didn't have half as many jewels in as this one," said Edmund, not daring to place the dazzling item on his own head. "How much can all this be _worth_?"

"More than the present kingdom of Archenland, I dare say," said Caspian, shaking his head. "Aslan! I never saw so much gold in one place!"

"And this only half what King Ram owned," mused his friend. "Well, King Corin will be happy to have it restored to his treasure chambers, no doubt! We ought to make for Barwell directly, Sire; gather a fleet…"

"And carry the treasure back to Archenland!" cried Lucy delightedly.

"And descend on Black Barwicke's rabble before they can slip out to sea again, Queen Lucy!"

The children gaped. "I'd quite forgotten the pirates," admitted Edmund.

"Only Drinian, faced with these ancient wonders, would have failed to forget a villain that's never seen a thousandth of this wealth," Caspian joked affectionately. "Very well, my Lord, we'll take action against Master Barwicke immediately; you'll want a Narnian squadron to reach us before striking against the villain's base, of course?"

"Aye; and that ought to allow us time to bring Her Majesty and Daniela to view the treasure in its resting place."

"I doubt they'll be quite so eager for the adventure, knowing there are pirates within a league of this island," said Caspian.

"Nonsense!" said Lucy robustly, laying down the pearl-encrusted perfume bottle she had been stroking with reluctance. "All right, let's go! How far is it to Barwell, by the way?"

"We must be well south of it, surely?" Edmund tried to remember the town from his own visits to Archenland, hundreds of years ago to the Narnians. "All right, Lu, I'm ready to go. I suppose this means rowing again, Drinian, doesn't it?"


	9. Chapter 9 Archenland Stands Readyish

Author's Note: Archenland takes a bit of a bashing in this chapter, for which I'm sorry; I'm working on another fic where she gets a much better press!

_**Archenland Stands Ready-ish**_

Great was the consternation at the busy port of Barwell that lunchtime when the small sailboat carrying the King of Narnia, his ancient predecessors (and their kinsman) and his Lord High Admiral wove her way to the quayside. The young and untried Darin, commander of the Fleet of Archenland, was summoned in haste from his residence on the edge of the town; messengers were sent galloping to Anvard that King Corin might be brought to salute his aunt's son and brother sovereign. And while the children gabbled about treasure and Caspian called for a herald to gallop north to his Royal Lodge, Drinian and Darin consulted charts, debated strategies, and, at length, came to a tentative agreement on the squadron that would end the long and murderous career of pirate Barwicke and his mob.

"You have not your seal, my Lord," said Caspian worriedly, watching his friend scrawl a terse instruction to be despatched post-haste to Rhince back aboard the Dawn Treader.

"Rhince knows my hand well enough." That was true, though whether the Mate would be able to read the sloping scribble was another matter entirely. "And I've my ring."

So saying, he slipped the broad gold signet ring he always wore from his middle finger, lifting it to the light so the sun flashed off a tiny chip of diamond in the oval's top corner. He folded the note, sealed it with a drop of hot wax and thrust the ring into the gooey stain, leaving a clear impression of the ancient Etinsmere device: a ship, naturally enough, with all sail set and the bow pointed straight at the family's guiding star.

"We'll send our swiftest sloop to Lionmead," Darin assured him. "Perhaps you'd care to come aboard our flagship while we await His Majesty's arrival?"

"Oh, yes, please!" cried Lucy, clapping her hands. "We adore ships, do let's go aboard!"

Nobody raised objection and so, aboard a little gig rowed by four untidy sailors, the Narnian party was carried across Barwell Bay to the galleon Pire Pass. Darin clambered aboard first, hissing a clearly audible warning to the men who greeted him; then Caspian, Lucy, Eustace, Edmund and Drinian hopped over the side rail and onto the unpolished deck.

"Goodness!" whispered Lucy. "She's not exactly the Dawn Treader, is she?"

"Will she float, do you think?" wondered Caspian under his breath.

"No doubt of that, Sire; but so'll a leaking barrel for a little while." A sweeping glance was enough to confirm Drinian's determination that _his_ ships would manage the seizure of Pirate Barwicke. "Aslan, I think they've got worse! Just look at the condition of the rigging. Not seen a coat o' tar these three years past, I'll wager!"

The ends of the rigging were frayed, Lucy noted, and not only the decks were in dire need of a good polishing, for the brasswork of all the rails was tarnished and green. The crew slouched around the decks, heaving themselves to attention only when directly addressed: and what a scruffy, unkempt set they were!

Caspian noted the same things, but with a definite twinge of pride. "Cousin Corin," he whispered aside, "has nothing in his fleet to match our meanest sloop, still less my gallant Dawn Treader! Small wonder Drinian speaks of his old service with such disdain!"

"Caspian hush, Darin might hear!" Lucy rebuked him mildly.

"Which of our ships have you summoned, my Lord?" he asked, loud enough for all the idlers to hear as they ambled aft toward the poop. Drinian grinned.

"The Dawn Treader and Great Lion galleons, Your Majesty; and the brigantine Isle of Ramandu, for work in shallower waters. There seemed to me ample room for a well-handled vessel between the schooner's mooring and the shore."

"Darin won't mind that we've three of our ships in his waters?"

"Darin, Queen Lucy, is only too glad to hand over so slippery a fish as Barwicke to Narnia." It might be true, or the other might be hiding his resentment. It mattered little enough, so long as the job was done.

_Rat-tat-a-tat! Rat-tat-a-tat-tat! _

The sudden, rhythmical thumping stopped their lazy wander in its tracks. The children and Caspian stared; Drinian frowned. And before anyone could speak, a stentorian voice bellowed from one end of the ship to the other. "All hands to witness punishment! All hands to witness punishment!"

"Perhaps Darin will allow that we adjourn to his quarters," said Drinian quietly. Eustace picked his chin up off the floor.

"Are they - is somebody going to be - well…"

"Flogged," Edmund finished flatly. "I remember seeing a flogging once - when we were here first time 'round. Lu, d'you recall…"

"Susan and I didn't watch." Lucy bit hard into her bottom lip. "Do you think Darin will expect…"

"I doubt it." Caspian (he hoped) sounded reassuring. "My Lord Darin! Will you allow that we escort Queen Lucy below for the duration of the coming - unpleasant event?"

"Oh! Your Majesty - I had quite forgot! But yes, you'll find my quarters on the port side below, of course you must make yourselves easy there." Darin hurried to join them, his reverence made ungainly by distraction. "'Tis but a deserter retaken. A pestilential fellow we'd be well rid of him but an example must be made, else we should scarce have the crew for a single sloop o' war! Boson's mate! Four dozen, and not a lash less! Had I but thought I should have tarried ashore before bringing Your Majesties…yes, yes, do go below, I shall join you presently to consider our strategy."

"You are too kind, sir," Caspian murmured faintly, shepherding his party from the poop and down through the hatch into the darkness below. On the companionway they encountered the prisoner and his escort; a brawny fellow, stripped to the waist and bound at the wrists, apparently untroubled by what lay ahead. He spared the visitors not a glance, though they stared at him with sympathetic curiosity. "Poor beggar!" muttered Edmund with feeling, leaning into the port side door. "Well!"

"In one regard at least, my Lord Drinian, this flagship of Archenland surpasses our Dawn Treader," said Caspian, whistling between his teeth. "Your cabin I've always considered modest in its appointments; beside this it seems positively spartan."

"Mine's the cabin of a captain at sea, Your Majesty." Drinian was regarding the silk-upholstered armchairs, the gold inlay on the writing desk, the stacked wine rack in the corner, with obvious distaste. "If this coxcomb's got beyond the Barwell Roads I'd be surprised! No, Lucy, stay away from the sternlights. Punishment's given aft; on an upturned grating leaned against the poop rail most often. The sound will carry."

The voice of their host floated in confirmation of the warning. "Mate! Landin, read the relevant article of the code, and let all hands pay it good heed!"

"He sounds like he's _enjoying_ it!" hissed Eustace. Drinian snorted.

"The only way some captains can remind their crews of their authority's to wave the lash in one hand and the naval code in the other."

"And what sailor's going to respect a commander like Darin?" agreed Edmund. "He's a dandy; he's playing at being Lord Admiral, that's all."

"His predecessor was the same." Nothing for it but to sit quiet and wait, Drinian decided, deliberately perching on the least luxurious seat in the room. "Caspian, draw the curtains across the sternport. They're good woollens, they may dull the sound a touch."

The King obeyed, casting the cabin into gloom. Everyone fell silent. Every ear strained.

They heard the swoosh as the lash was whirled; then the thwack of the thin leather ends - nine of them - slashing deep into unyielding human flesh. "Ouf!" gasped Edmund. "That'd knock the wind from a fellow's sails!"

_Thwack!_ The second strike was followed by a soft mewling sound, that of an animal in pain. Lucy jammed her hands against her ears.

Caspian and the boys couldn't stop themselves listening, starting up from their seats when the soft squeaks from the criminal rose to awful, breathless cries. "Aslan, how many more?" breathed the King, balling his fists.

Over the relentless crack of the whip they could hear a voice (Edmund thought it was Darin's) steadily counting off the strokes. Nobody in the shaded cabin moved until the forty-eighth blow had been struck.

Then, they all sighed.

"Cut him down!" That was definitely the commander. "And clean these bloodstains before His Majesty can reach us! Landin, you have the ship. I'll join our guests below."

"He needn't bother," grated Edmund. "The brute _did_ enjoy it!"

"I want to get some air," said Lucy miserably. "Can't we go on deck?"

"Not yet." Drinian had seen the mess made by a thorough flogging, and he would sooner the more delicate stomachs of his companions be spared it. "Stay down here, and keep our host babbling of strategy - which I doubt he can spell, still less construct! Ah, my Lord Darin; the ugly business finished?"

"The wretch is in the hands of our physician. He's a poor enough fellow, he'll double the sufferings before the villain's mended. Now, I have my charts here. Your Majesties, if you'd be so kind as to stand back. This operation is the province of the naval man."

Which made it lucky all round, Edmund decided, that Drinian, a sailor to his fingertips, would have charge of the affray. "When will the Dawn Treader arrive?" asked Lucy, who wanted nothing more than to be off Lord Darin's ship.

"Tomorrow nightfall, Ma'am. If Your Lordship's fleet can provide a galleon, a frigate, and a sloop…"

"It will be done," Darin promised, though he looked, Eustace decided, rather less bullish now actual numbers were being named. "What has your Lordship in mind for the destruction of this villain?"

Caspian winked at Edmund. Eustace heaved an audible sigh of relief.

"We'll catch the blackguard in a pincer betwixt a pair o' galleons," said Drinian, as if it were obvious. "Your frigate, with the sloop and our brig, ought to be sufficient to stop a rescue by any force Barwicke might have in support ashore. Between the Dawn Treader and this ship - or the Great Lion, depending on your preference - with the third galleon athwart the channel, we'll trap the schooner and carry her by boarding. She's a pretty piece; be a fine addition to your fleet."

"I fear my fellows are ill-schooled in boarding," Darin admitted, flushing. "Our fighting with these rogues has been done at - somewhat greater distance."

Eustace sniggered. Lucy aimed a kick at his ankle. Caspian pursed his lips at them.

"Then if your Lordship will place this ship across Barwicke's escape, Captain Sarin and myself will oversee the carrying of the schooner." Relief all around, thought Edmund. Darin could sit back and bask in the operation's success, while Drinian managed all. Even Caspian wasn't discreet enough to hide his smirk.

"Milord! The King's party's entered town!"

"Thank you, Landin." Were Rhince ever to address _his_ chief so there would be a flogging aboard the Dawn Treader, Eustace considered. "Now, if Your Majesties will follow me; His Majesty will be most eager to hear all of your adventures. Come, come, I'll lead the way!"

"Pompous twit!" muttered Edmund as the Archenlander pattered ahead, the fur-trimmed edge of his short mantle kicking up into Lucy's face. "Ugh! He's even got _scent_ in his clothes! No wonder his ship's such a fright!"

Caspian's cousin King Corin proved to be an oddity the match of his senior sailor. Tall and gangling, with a shock of ginger hair and a large, weak mouth, he pumped every hand with soggy enthusiasm, exclaiming over the Ancient Sovereigns looking so _well-preserved_ before positively swooning at the mention of his predecessor's treasure.

"Anna's treasure? You're quite sure, of course, that these trinkets are Anna's hoard, not that of some - well, highly successful brigand?" he yelped. Caspian sighed.

"As sure as we can be, with such meagre evidence as this map; Edmund, show Corin what brought us to his islands."

"Lion Alive, how could you have been guided to _any _place by _that_?" squawked the King of Archenland, almost tearing the fragile parchment (and making more than just Edmund wince) in his eagerness to caress it. "And - and it remains intact, the treasure? Under the very nose of this demon that's tormented our honest merchants these seven years at least? Come, we must see it for ourselves!"

"With the pirates nearby? Your Majesty cannot be serious!" wailed Lord Darin, wringing his soft white hands. Never hauled on a rope in rough weather in his life, thought Caspian. By the Mane of Aslan, I'm starting to think like Drinian! "No, no, impossible! _When_ the Narnian ships - and ours - have defeated the devils, then of course your flagship will carry you with pride to reclaim your treasure."

"Aslan, 'tis not mine, Darin, it belongs - oh, but the match was never made, so it _can't_ lawfully be owed to the King of Terebinthia, can it?"

"If Your Majesty would convey it to pirates, Barwicke's closer and more honest," muttered Drinian stiffly.

"My Lord Drinian served your father's fleet during the Pirate Wars, Cousin," said Caspian placatingly. "And no, though I understand little of the law despite Doctor Cornelius's teaching, I should say Terebinthia has no lawful claim to the hoard."

"Then it _is_ mine!" Corin almost danced a jig on the spot. Caspian clicked his tongue.

"Say more truly Archenland's; or the world's," he objected. "And as to inspecting it in its resting place, why! My wife and Drinian's will come, pirate rabble or no!"

"They can watch the action from the highest point of the island, Sire," Drinian suggested, steeling himself, Edmund guessed, to displease his sovereign. "With Your Majesties and Eustace, and a few skilled swordsmen for an escort. _No_, Queen Lucy! You cannot bide on the Dawn Treader with pirates and murderers in the offing. I'll not hear of it."

"Nor shall I," added Caspian, moving smoothly to pre-empt the next strike. "However, _We_ shall not be denied _Our_ part in the action."

"I beseech Your Majesty," Drinian began, knowing, Lucy suspected, that protest would avail him little against a display of implacable Royal Will.

"I shall remain on the poop beyond reach of the enemy, Drinian," Caspian pledged, laying a hand on his friend's arm. "You have my word; I'll merely observe while you - no doubt - lead our fellows against the enemy, sword in hand."

"I prefer my cutlass for close fighting, Sire." The assurance, though sincerely meant, might not be kept in the excitement of the moment. Drinian made a mental note to assign a reliable man to keep a watch on His Majesty, but in public he would never question his master's ability to abide by his word.

In private, _that_ would be a different matter.

"Now you must all come ashore, we've accommodation made ready for you overnight; and has Darin showed you over the ship yet? No? She's quite the pride of our fleet, our Royal Pire Pass!" Corin's bright head bobbed as he spoke, reminding Lucy of a toy dog she had seen at Marjorie Evans' house last summer. "We shall do it tomorrow, my Lord, what say you? And the famous Dawn Treader is Barwell bound, we hear? My Lord Drinian, you'll allow us to view her, won't you?"

"Very gladly, if it be Your Majesty's wish," answered Drinian promptly, and with almost perfect sincerity.

"Why, we hear she's quite the marvel of the age," Corin prattled eagerly. "Still, I dare wager you'll find our _lady_ quite satisfactory. Come along, Darin, you'll be glad to show her off, won't you? From top to tail, isn't that the sailor's phrase?"

"Stem to stern, Sire; stem to stern," clucked the Admiral of Archenland, a touch sheepishly.

"He knows," Edmund whispered, feeling a first pang of pity for a man hopelessly out of his depth but meaning well enough. "He knows our royal galleon outshines theirs_. _I wonder if Corin will understand it?"

Whatever the King of Archenland's sentiments might be, Edmund Pevensie realised suddenly he was exceptionally proud to be a King of Narnia.

* * *

It had taken, Caspian thought, all his considerable self control not to burst out laughing as he trailed his innocent cousin around the unscrubbed decks of the Pire Pass on the following day, after a night spent ashore at an estate outside the town named Queen's Cottage, traditionally a gift to a newlywed consort. He had not dared catch Drinian's eye. The ship was shabby, her crew slovenly, and yet Corin truly believed her as grand as the famous Dawn Treader.

"Milord there's a - no, two - hang it, think there's a third - sail comin' from north-westish!"

Only Eustace noticed how Drinian's fists clenched at the irregular manner of the masthead's hail. The rest of the Narnians were too busy giggling, or racing for the poop to stare aft. The voice floated down again.

"Mus' be the Narnians, milord!"

Those who could do so without attracting notice reached for telescopes; others clambered up the lattice of the rigging (at peril of their lives, Eustace thought) to peer into the red-gold streaked charcoal of the evening sky. "It _is_ them!" shouted Edmund as three ships, line astern, crested the horizon. Every Narnian heart skipped a proud beat.

From the corner of his eye, Caspian watched his cousin's mouth drop open. Her dragon prow glowing orange in the fading light the Dawn Treader surged with the wind, her great purple sail curving from the mast where the Lion banner of Narnia streamed. In her wake came her sister galleon Great Lion, adorned with a snarling figurehead that ought to frighten any enemy out of fighting before battle could be joined; then the stout, sturdy brig Isle of Ramandu, the most recently launched of all the Narnian fleet. "They look well," murmured Drinian.

"Indeed." Caspian smiled tolerantly. "The Lord Drinian has built up our fleet from naught, Cousin; he has good cause to take pride in the achievement. I dare say, my Lord, you'll wish to go aboard and inform Rhince of his impending duties."

"Aye, Sire; and if my Lord Darin will summon his captains we might all meet ashore to discuss tomorrow morning's action." Politely, everyone pretended not to notice the Lord Darin blenching at the thought.

"I - yes, of course, gladly; we shall convene our council of war at my residence, and--"

"Celesta! Daniela! Look, they're on the fo'c'sle!" shrieked Lucy, waving madly. "Oh, can't we come aboard with you, Drinian? You'll be busy with Rhince, and they'll want to know everything about the treasure island! Do say we can come with you!"


	10. Chapter 10 Battle Stations

_**Battle Stations**_

They were rowed across the anchorage for a jubilant reunion aboard the Dawn Treader, where men clustered on deck or hung from the rigging to give three lusty cheers as their King and Captain came aboard. Celesta forgot her careful dignity to fly at her husband with anxious questions while the children shouted over each other in their eagerness to best describe the fabulous treasure hoard. Only Daniela stood aside, her brown head cocked, watching her husband as he addressed his grinning deputy.

"Well, Rhince?"

"Very well, Sir; we'm all set for pirate huntin', which is more'n I'd say for them damned lubbers," said the Mate, jabbing a stubby, tobacco-stained finger in the general direction of the Archenlandish fleet. "I've seen bumboats in better condition off Terebinthia, I 'ave!"

"Indeed, but their admiral is fully aware of their deficiencies. The carrying of Barwicke's schooner will be a Narnian affair. My Lady."

"Only you," Daniela chided gently, extending her hand to be kissed, "could go seeking ancient treasure and end finding a nest of pirates! I gather by the furore ashore His Archenlandish Majesty is in attendance?"

"Aye." It amused her, and Drinian knew it, to see him so ill at ease; she knew her presence aboard brought the two creatures that inhabited him, sailor and nobleman, into conflict. "Erlick! Signal our ships: captains to go ashore. Rhince, you'll attend this _conference_ at the Admiral's residence, and when honour's been satisfied I'll give you orders to convey to our fellows. Aye, lower our own boat. If Your Majesties are ready, King Corin seems to be awaiting us on the quay."

"_Bother_ Corin!" muttered Caspian uncharitably. "You'll see immediately, my dear, why his own subjects call him Corin Cracked-Pate! Very well, if we _must_ go ashore, I suppose we must! Tell me, Drinian, how ever did you endure service with so ragged a fleet?"

"Everything I know about how _not_ to handle a ship, Sire, I learned in the service of Archenland," Drinian answered easily, handing the ladies over the side into the waiting boat. "Boson! You have the ship until Rhince or I return."

* * *

The next morning saw the Narnians assembling again on the quay. The majority came north from the Queen's Cottage, while Drinian and Daniela arrived looking harassed in the company of Admiral Darin, their host overnight. The ladies, with King Corin and the children, were settled aboard the Lady Elizabetha (Lucy's last, plaintive plea to be allowed to join the Dawn Treader having been firmly squashed by Caspian and Drinian together) accompanied by a strong escort of swords- and bow- men. Buckling on their armour, the two men were rowed out to the Dawn Treader which, to the relief of both admirals Edmund suspected, was to lead and command the squadron.

Two hours of sailing saw the Lady Elizabetha moored behind the treasure island, her passengers squatting atop its larger hill with telescopes at the ready as they surveyed the deceptively tranquil scene. Barwicke's schooner bobbed in her wide, sheltered bay; figures strolled on deck, and occasional shouts could be heard carrying on the still air as pirates aboard joked with cohorts on land. "They're loading up," said Edmund seriously. "Barwicke must be intending to put out again tonight. We're only just in time!"

"Look!" Daniela's telescope - actually Drinian's second best - was trained on the horizon over which the squadron was making its majestic way, the Narnian flagship at the fore. Everyone turned in time to see the first Archenlander (not the Pire Pass, it surprised none of them to note) yaw out of line. If a Narnian vessel were to be so poorly handled, Edmund decided, the captain would find himself cast ashore in no time.

"I hope," he muttered out of one side of his mouth, "they _fight_ better than they sail!"

"I doubt Drinian intends to let them close enough to prove their mettle," replied Celesta in the same way, tugging her thick woollen cloak closer around her slim shoulders. "There! That must be - what _is_ the term you use? Blueguard?"

"_Blackguard_," Eustace corrected, smacking his lips over the word. "That big, black-haired man who just knocked the littler fellow down? Is that Barwicke?"

"Aye." Corin no longer sounded such an amicable fool. "The villain has the blood of dozens on his hands."

"Pick up your skirts, my lady Dawn Treader," whispered Lucy, turning her glass to stare at the poop deck of the leading warship where she knew her friends would be. There! A flash of gold, dazzling in the sunlight, identified the Royal armour; and beside the King, issuing orders to the Boson (who would stay aboard the galleon) was Drinian.

Slowly - too slowly to the observers on the hill - the squadron came on under all sail. The closer it came, the tighter knots became in every stomach.

"Any time now they _must_ spot our mastheads!" whispered Edmund as the Dawn Treader came close enough, it seemed, to touch. From the main deck a gaggle of armed sailors waved.

On rounding the headland the two leading galleons peeled away, the Great Lion swinging out on a wide arc that would carry her to the farther side of the pirate craft. "Boarders, stand to your weapons!" yelled Drinian, brandishing his cutlass. Caspian swayed back.

"_Will_ you be careful with that thing!" he exclaimed crossly. "It's Barwicke's head you're come for, not mine!"

"Sorry." The pirates were running about their deck in confusion, knocking each other over in their rush to weigh anchor and get themselves to sea. "Helm hard a'lee, Rynelf! Stay put, Your Majesty!"

With that he was off, haring down the poop ladder and along the main deck. "Grappling hooks away!!" Caspian heard him holler as, with a crunching thud, the two ships crashed together.

Whooping, cheering, the Dawn Treaders piled over the side, dropping down to the schooner's deck with swords already swinging.

"Where's the Lion?" cried Lucy, wringing her hands. "Oh, my! There are _hundreds_ of them!"

His sister, Edmund considered, did exaggerate; but not by much. There were more pirates than Narnians in the heaving, shouting mass on the schooner's tight deck, and so still was the air he could pick out individual voices: the raw boom of Rhince; the gruff bark of Purlian; the absurdly shrill (for so big a man) Archenlandish twang of Barwicke; and the crisp, clear north Narnian accent of Drinian himself. "Get a move on, Sarin!" he whispered to the commander of the Great Lion.

Caspian, leaning over the poop rail, was murmuring the same thing as he struggled to make sense of the chaotic battle before him. To the untrained or distant eye, such as those of the spectators on the hill, it would, he thought, have been difficult to recognise friend from foe.

The schooner shuddered, her hull grating against that of her neighbour. The Great Lion ground against the starboard side, half her crew leaping down to join the affray. Screaming, terrified pirates turned to meet the new threat. Some were slashed down from fore and aft; others, luckier or wiser, hurled themselves overboard into the icy waters of the bay.

"Cowards! Poltroons!" shouted King Corin, almost dancing with indignation on his hilltop. "Stand and fight like men!"

A flight of arrows sliced across their line of sight, falling around the cottage where dozens more pirates were gathered, screaming at the combatants on deck. "The brig!" shouted Edmund. "She's opened fire on Barwicke's cottage!"

Closer in to shore, the crew of the little sloop followed suit. "Why does my frigate do nothing?" demanded Corin petulantly.

As if in answer, the largest of the three ships lined before the beach spat out a ragged volley toward the helpless pirates on shore. "Um, Drinian's very keen on battle drill," said Eustace, acutely embarrassed for the Archenlander. "Even in the eastern sea he insisted the men practise their shooting at least once a week."

"I doubt our captains have ordered the firing of more than a single arrow in salute since the Pirate Wars," Corin admitted, determined that would quickly change. "Look how they flee! Cowards!"

None could accuse the pirate chief of liverishness, however feebly his shipmates might attempt to desert him. Sword flailing, Black Barwicke fought on wildly, backing his way aft toward the poop ladder. Drinian, parrying his blows with contemptuous ease, gave a quick nod to his deputy.

Rhince and Peridan stepped up behind the shrieking pirate. Fingers inflexible as wrought iron bit into his raised arms. And though he fought and kicked and cursed, Barwicke was helpless to free himself from his chortling captors.

On seeing their leader overcome the remaining handful of pirate crew threw down their weapons at the feet of the Narnians. Caspian bolted from his perch and dropped over the rail, determined not to miss another minute.

Barwicke stood at the heart of a Narnian knot, his broad, flat face mottled red and white with fury as he screeched the most vicious stream of blasphemy any King of Narnia ever heard. His captors, with heads cocked and expressions alert, gave every appearance of offering a courteous hearing. "Divide the prisoners between our ships," Drinian instructed, wiping the gory blade of his cutlass against the deck.

"Aye, Sir." Rhince affirmed. No need to ask which vessel would carry the leader to captivity! "What 'bout the ship, Cap'n?"

"A prize crew will come aboard from the Pire Pass. Leave her for them."

"Aye aye, Sir. She'll be a fair gain for their fleet, what with a new name an' a lick o' paint!"

"Or just a new name!" called another, from the safety of the crowd. People (even a King) sniggered.

"The squadron will sail for Barwell immediately. There'll be quite a gathering to greet you, Master Barwicke, and all laid on by His Archenlandish Majesty. Take him below; and see him properly guarded!"

"Aye, Cap'n. You'll be wantin' the boat, Sir, take 'is Majesty an' you over to the island?"

"Thank you, Rhince. Ah, Sarin! What are our casualties?"

The captain of the Great Lion was numbered amongst them; blood oozed slowly from a gash in his lower leg, bandaged with a strip of canary-coloured cloth from a pirate jerkin. "None dead, Sir; a dozen wounded, only one seriously - a fellow of my company slashed in the stomach, but he'll do well enough. Of the others - only the laziest will find excuse to avoid duty by nightfall."

"And the villains?"

"Twenty dead, twenty-eight prisoners and more - how many, I dare not guess - jumped overboard." Sarin grinned at his admiral. "We might hope the Pire Pass picks 'em up."

"Naught wrong in hoping," agreed Caspian doubtfully. Drinian's lips twitched.

"Well, if Your Majesty is willing, we'll get the squadron underway and retreat to the island," he said formally. Caspian inclined his head.

"At your pleasure, my Lord. Captain Sarin, our heartiest congratulations and thanks to your company. Ah! I see a boat coming from the Pire Pass; that will be the _prize crew_, will it not? I suggest we abandon the vessel to their care."


	11. Chapter 11 Adventure's End

Author's Note: Here's the final installment. Thank you anyone who has managed to get this far, and particular thanks for those who've been kind enough to review.

_**Adventure's End**_

As they splashed ashore on the treasure island their friends came streaming at full speed down the hill to greet them. "Are you all right?" cried Daniela.

"There were _dozens_ of them!" shouted Lucy.

"What of - ouf!" Corin's question ended on a frightened yell, disappearing into the ground as the island gave way beneath his feet. "Help!"

"Oh, well _done_!" exclaimed Caspian as the slightly soiled carrot head of his cousin emerged between the feet of a startled Narnian bowman. "You've found the chamber entrance!"

"So I have." Blinking the dirt from his eyes, Corin grinned. "There seems to be room for a dozen treasure hoards; but I see nothing."

"To your right, Sire, there's a passageway," said Drinian, biting off the sarcastic answer he would (Caspian thought) certainly have offered to the other reigning monarch in the company. "If you'll stand back while we hand the ladies down - have you lanterns, Romin?"

"Five of 'em, Sir."

"Oh, pass one down before the ladies come - it's devilish dark," shouted Corin, underground except for the hand waving helplessly. A sturdy Narnian sailor slapped a silver-framed lantern into the palm. "Oh! Good, excellent, thank you."

"Stand back, Cousin." With Edmund holding back the turf to reveal the entrance, and Corin ready to steady the descent, Caspian handed his wife into the breach. "Carefully, my dear; now, Daniela, if you are ready…"

The mistress of Etinsmere needed assistance from no man. Queen Lucy herself could not clamber into the void more nimbly, which she proceeded to prove. "Boys?" said Caspian, waving an airy hand.

Another minute and the whole party was huddled in the circular chamber, larger than anyone had expected in the light of five bright lanterns. "My Lord Drinian and I will lead," said Caspian cheerfully. "You'll know when we come close to the treasure the moment you hear the sea pounding overhead. Then we turn a corner and…"

"Here it is," murmured Corin reverently a few minutes later, with all eight explorers surrounded by glinting gold and flashing stones. The light of their raised lamps catching the ancient coins which spilled from their iron-bound chests where the wood had rotted away gave the rough cavern a fiery glow, and every step was taken with care lest a foot crush another dainty brooch or ornament. "It _must_ be the Fair Maid's payment! There - Lion Alive! I am in awe!"

"Here!" Edmund straightened up from his inspection of one large pile of coin. "_This_ is Ram the Ancient! All the coins have his portrait on them. What better proof could we want?"

"A letter to the King o' Terebinthia?" suggested Drinian, fingering a golden helmet studded with rubies, diamonds and pearls in three circles. "Or - this!"

As every eye turned his way, he eased something - wax, Lucy realised, dulled and tarnished wax, a seal from a great treasure chest - from the floor. "Your Majesty will know the device," he said, presenting it with a flourish to Corin.

"The Royal Seal of the realm." The King could only shake his head, too afraid of harming it to touch the fragile trophy. "Cousin, I congratulate you - and apologise that I ever doubted (which I did!)You have truly discovered the mythical treasure of King Ram, and all of Archenland will thank you for it."

"We don't need thanking for an adventure." cried Edmund. "I've done many an odd thing in this world, but I never thought I should actually take part in a real treasure hunt. When we get back to Narnia, we shall have to tell Lady Herringbone what that _nasty, dirty scrap of parchment_ from her precious box really was!"

"You may do that beyond my hearing, King Edmund," said Daniela, lifting a pearl and diamond necklace held together with dainty links of white gold to the light. "Even today, our craftsmen would struggle to match this workmanship! Alicia will be incandescent with excitement when she discovers the _Archenlandish suitor _of the ancestor was - perhaps - descended from the treasure-thiefs of the legend!"

"Hmm, maybe we oughtn't tell her," agreed Eustace seriously. Caspian sighed.

"We must bear it with patience, friends; we can hardly keep secret the trail that brought us to this particular island, of all the lonely places where a hoard might be concealed! What will you do with these wonders, Cousin? Display them or bolt them into your vaults?"

"Our vaults could never contain so much!" Exclaiming over this and that, the group split to inspect every niche and corner of the chamber. "And as you did remark, this - this _wonder_ belongs, not to a single man, but to the world. Nay, it must be displayed - securely, of course, and under constant guard. We shall have it ferried to the mainland, and there put on permanent display."

"I think Anna would have liked that," said Lucy slowly.

"Better than she'd have liked being bought by it!" agreed Edmund. "Glory! I do think, Lu, this has been the nicest of all our adventures!"

"Yes, but how did the treasure ever get here?" Eustace wanted to know. "Whatever the treasure story says, it didn't fly off the ships by itself. What d'you think, Drinian?"

"Perhaps a pirate raid during the night's battle?"

"Maybe some of the crew weren't as honest as the legend suggests?" added Edmund. "Or - perhaps the treasure never even got aboard the Fair Maid of Terebinthia?"

"Dummy chests carried aboard while the real treasure was stowed here all the while?" Drinian's eyes sparkled. "There's no knowing who supervised the loading of the treasure fleet, Your Majesties, so it must be possible."

"Or perhaps," suggested his wife, with an exaggerated sigh, "the story of its disappearance grew in the telling. You'll admit yourself, my Lord, sailors' tales have been known to do that."

"One only has to listen to Erlick talking about the length of the sea serpent we met between Burnt Island and Deathwater to know that," Edmund agreed, laughing. Drinian grinned.

"That's as like as not to be true, though there's small enough need to exaggerate the trouble that brute caused," he replied. Caspian laughed.

"How ever it may have come to be here, we may safely say Anna's treasure is found" he said happily. "Now Cousin, let's return to the surface. Your men ought to begin fetching the hoard at once, if you're to have it safely home before nightfall."

* * *

Only two more things ought to be told. Pirate Barwicke was forced to return all the loot he had gathered in his murderous career before being hanged, with the last remnants of his crew, from the yardarm of the Pire Pass. His ghost still hovers on stormy nights, sailors say, over the place in Barwell Bay where his final ship was moored.

As for the treasure hoard: King Corin kept his promise and the Fair Maid of Terebinthia's marriage portion was returned to its homeland to be displayed in all its splendour; and there it can be seen to this day (should you be lucky enough to find a way into that world). Only a few pieces were removed.

For Corin insisted that each of the treasure seekers should choose one piece as a reminder of their adventures. Lucy selected a brooch shaped like a lily, with diamonds surrounding a ruby centre and a loose chain of emeralds for stalk and leaves. Edmund picked a short gold dagger with the hilt shaped into a lion's head. As for Eustace, he took with him a gold chain belt with a diamond and pearl buckle. All three beautiful things returned to this world when their owners did.

Caspian chose a gold cup edged with silver and standing on a base of rock crystal which now resides in the royal vaults of Cair Paravel. And Drinian selected a gold ship with delicate silver wire for rigging, topped by a ruby at the masthead, which still can be seen in the possession of the Lords of Etinsmere. A few coins (it must be reported) vanished from the trove, pocketed by sailors of the Archenlandish ships sent to fetch the hoard home. King Corin laughed, shrugged and dismissed the loss, so in a handful of Archenlandish cottages still there are fragments of the finest marriage portion never paid: fascinating trinkets associated as much now with the reign of Narnia's tenth Caspian as Archenland's second Ram.


End file.
